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COJS^ TENTS. 



PAGE 

Eesolutions and Arrangements, 1 

Programme, 4 

Introductory Remarks by Col. T. S. Johnson, .... 6 

Historical Sketch by Hon. N. L. Johnson, 8 

Oration by Eichard H. Dana, Esq., 43 

Ode by Francis Dana, Esq., 72 

Address by George W. Horr, Esq., Athol, 74 

Address by James W. Brooks, Esq., Petersham, . . 83 

Address by Mr. Frederick T. Coraee, 88 

Address by Rev. Harlan Page, Hardwick, 93 

Address by Hon. George K. Tufts, New Braintree, 95 

Address by Rev. T. C. Martin, Warren, 98 

Address by Charles R. Johnson, Esq., Worcester, . 102 



RESOLUTIONS AND ARRANGEMENTS. 



/'■^Tl T THE annual town meeting held in Good 
(OyV Templars' Hall at North Dana, on the fifth 
^^>J \^^ day of March, 1900, the following- article 
appeared in the warrant : 

Article 20 : — To see if the town will take action in 
relation to celebrating the one-hundredth anniversary 
of the incorporation of the town, and raise money for 
the same. 

N. L. Johnson offered the following resolution : 
liesolver], That it is the sense of the voters of this 
town, in town meeting assembled, that the one hun- 
dredth anniversary of the incorporation of the town 
should be observed by a celebration suited to so 
important an occasion at such time in the year 1901 
as a committee to be chosen may appoint. 

This resolution was adopted and N. L. Johnson, 
Charles N. Doane and William J. Crawford were 
chosen a committee to carry it into effect. N. L. 
Johnson was chosen corresponding secretary. 

In the warrant calling the annual town ineeting to 
be held on the fourth day of March, 1901, the four- 
teenth article read as follows : 



I DANA CENTENNIAL. 

"To see if the town will raise a sufficient sum of 
money to defray the expenses of a centennial celebra- 
tion to be held the j^resent year ; to fix a time for 
holding' the same, and to choose the necessary officers, 
or a committee who sha-l'have the g'eneral manage- 
ment aud conduct of carrying into effect such cele- 
bration, or to act on any matters in relation thereto." 

At the annual town meeting held on the fourth day 
of March, 19U1, it was voted "that the sum of live 
hundred dollars be raised and appro})riated to defray 
the expenses of a centennial celebration of the incor- 
poration of this town on some day during the present 
year." There were fifty-three votes in the affirmative, 
and one in the negatiA^e. 

On motion of N. L. Johnson, the chair appointed a 
committee of seven gentlemen to nominate a perma- 
neiit executive committee of nine to make arrange- 
ments for the celebration, and to fix the time and 
place for holding the same, and to have the general 
management and conduct of the celebration and 
report to the town. The following gentlemen were 
reported by the nominating committee to constitute 
the permanent executive committee, to wit : N. L. 
Johnson, Charles N. Doane, David L. Richards, 
Theodore S. Johnson, Frank D. Stevens, Joseph 
French Johnson, Frank S. Grover, Charles R. John- 
sou and AYi.liam J. Crawford. Thev were imani- 



RESOLUTIONS AN'D ARRANGEMENTS. d 

mously elected, and Thursday, the tweuty-secoud 
day of August, was iixed by the executive committee 
as the time for holding the celebration, and the place 
Dana Common. 

Agreeably to the foregoing resolution and arrange- 
ments, the people of Dana celebrated the one hun- 
dredth birthday of their town on Dana Common on 
the twenty-second day of August, 1001. The weather 
was proi^itious, and the celebration in all respects 
successful. Several tents were erected on the Com- 
mon and the houses in the village were handsomely 
decorated. The literary exercises were held in a large 
tent near the town house. At one o'clock a luncheon 
was served in this tent. At the Eagle House and in 
an adjoining tent dinner was served to those who 
desired l:>y Landlord Grover. It is estimated that at 
least two thousand persons were present, of whom 
many came from other states. Excellent music 
throughout the day Avas furnished by the North 
Dana Band. The exercises began at 10.80 a. m., Col. 
T. S. Johnson of "Worcester presiding. 



4 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

The order of exercises was as follows : 

MOENING EXERCISES. 

MUSIC, 

Concert by the Band. 

PRAYER, 

By Rev. Harlan Page. 

INTRODUCTORY REMARKS, 

By Col. T. S. Johnson. 

ADDRESS OF WELCOME AND HISTORICAL SKETCH, 

By Hon. N. L. Johnson. 

HYMN TUNE, OLD HUNDRED. 

Great God of nations, now to thee 
Our hymn of gratitude we raise. 

With humble heart and bending knee, 
We offer thee our song of praise. 

Thy name we bless, Almighty God, 
For all the kindness thou hast shown 

To this fair land the jjilgTims trod. 
This land we fondly call our own. 

Here Freedom spreads her banner wide. 
And casts her soft and hallowed ray ; 

Here thou our fathers' stejDs didst guide 
In safety through theii' dangerous way. 



PROGRAMME. O 

We praise tliee, that the gospel's Hght 
Through all our land its radiance sheds ; 

Dispels the shades of error's night, 

And heavenly blessings round us spreads. 

Great God, preserve us in thy tear ; 

In dangers stUl oru* guardian be ; 
Oh sjjread thy truths bnglit precepts here, 

Let all the people worship thee. 

OEATIOX, 

By Eichard H. Dana, Esq., of Cambridge. 

ODE. 

Written by Francis, Dana, Esq., of New York. 

Read l>v Miss Emma Grover of Dana. 



AFTERNOON EXERCISES. 

Address by George W. Horr, Esq., Athol. 

James W. Brooks, Esq., Petersham. 

Frederick T. Comee, Esq., Woonsocket, R. I. 

Rev. Harlax Page, Hardwick. 

Hon. Geo. K. Tufts, New Braintree. 

Rev. T. C. Martin, Warren. 

Charles R. Johnson, Esq., Worcester. 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS 

By Col. T. S. Johnson. 



Sons and Daughters of Dana, Ladies and Gentle- 
men : — We have gathered here to commemorate a 
birthday. A hundred years have passed since Dana 
entered upon her corporate existence and took her 
place as the youngest of forty-nine sister towns, then 
comprising the county of Worcester. A century old 
now, but still a comely matron, — she is on this sum- 
mer morning arrayed in holiday attire and has bidden 
her children home. How her summons has been 
ansAvered this grand assemblage testifies. From near 
and far, unmindful of threatening storm, we have 
come in gladness to proffer our congratulations and 
to rejoice with her that she has reached a venerable 
age, while retaining so much of the freshness and 
vigor and beauty of youth. Charming she is, and 
charming to us she will ever be. Everyone of her 
hills and valleys is dear to some of us, — there is no 
foot of her soil that does not glow with bright memo- 
ries to some of us, — her very name is music to all 
our ears. 

Of her numerous family a large number have wan- 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. ( 

dered beyond her little territory and in the great 
world outside have done, and are doing, their work 
in life ; others have remained at the old home and 
here have made enviable records and gained rewards 
which are the fruit of industry and honest, intelligent, 
well directed effort. 

Of such is a loyal and distinguished son, avIio for 
more than fifty years has filled a prominent place in 
this community. Of rare business ability and skill, 
of sterling character, his reputation and influence 
long ago widened far beyond the borders of his town 
and county. Called into the employment of the state 
and returned again and again, he has served his 
district and the Commonwealth with talent, fidelity 
and zeal. His affection for his birthplace has been 
strong, constant and enduring. No assurance of 
more extended social acquaintance and enjoyment, no 
opportunity for financial i^rofit, no desire for fame 
has been sufficient to allure him to another dwelling- 
place. Here, at the home of his childhood, his youth 
and his manhood, he still abides. It is he who will 
meet us, as it were, at our dear old mother's open 
gate, on this her joyful anniversary, and in her name 
give us welcome greeting. 

I take great pleasure in introducing the President 
of the day, the Hon. N. L. Johnson. 



HISTORICAL SKETCH 

By Hon. N. L. Johxson. 



Ladies axd Gextlemen : — We are gathered here 
on no ordinary occasion. None of us will again par- 
ticipate here in another Hke it. We often greet onr 
friends with joyous congratulations upon the recur- 
rence of their birthdays, and in some manner celebrate 
those of our own, but we now ce^.ebrate the one hun- 
dredth birthday of a municipality, a corporation con- 
sisting of indiyiduals and their successors associated 
as one person for mutual interest. Three generations 
or more haye come and gone since our ancestors 
united their j^ersonal, local and municipal interests 
and organized this town, and the town still liyes, and 
perhaps is more alive than ever before. Individuals 
die, but society is so interwoven with and overlapj^ed 
by succeeding generations that it is self-perpetuating 
and never dies. None of those who joined in con- 
structing this municipality are with us in person. 
They have gone to their reward. We occupy their 
places and have entered upon their heritage. The 
burdens and responsibilities of its preservation and 



HISTORICAL SKETCH. 



9 



prosperity have descended from them aud rest upou 
the present generation. It seems littiug- that we, 
theu- successors, should call to remembrance the work 
of our ancestors who labored under conditions differ- 
ent from our own to plant institutions not to be long 
enjoyed by themselves, but for theii- posterity aud 
oiu-s. Perhaps for the reason that I am one of the 
oldest male native citizens of the town, if not the 
oldest living, it is made my duty, as it is a privilege, 
in behalf of the town to welcome not only its natives, 
but all former residents, those whose ancestors were 
natives, those who have found homes here, and all 
others who sympathize with us, to the enjoyment of 
the festivities of this occasion. And especially do 
we welcome our neighbors from the parent towns, a 
part of whose territory and inhabitants formed ours. 
Here to-day let us greet our friends, renew suspended 
acquaintances, and recall the pleasant memories of 
our youth and earlier days. 

It is not my purpose at this time to attempt to give 
a detailed history of the town. Time will not permit. 
Nor should I invade the ground of our honored 
orator. I shall endeavor to notice briefly matters of 
interest, with which some of the present inhabitants 
may not be familiar. 

I need not sav that this is one of the smallest. 



10 -DAN\ CENTENNIAL. 

newest, and most unpretentious towns in Worcester 
county. Its history is not sufficiently important and 
conspicuous to attract to any large extent public 
interest or notice. Its history is somewhat obscure, 
and belongs in part to that of the towns from which 
it was taken. 

Why did the people upon this territory desire to be 
incorporated and made a town? Why was its name 
made Dana, and why was this place made the centre ? 

It is certain that there was a small settlement, a 
nucleus of a village, — a few dwellings, a store, a tav- 
ern, a blacksmith's shop, a potash manufactory, and 
perhaps a tannery near where this tent now stands, — 
many years before the incorporation of the town. I 
well remember hearing my honored grandfather speak 
of ]Major Joel Amsden, as the keeper of a tavern which 
stood upon the site of the present hotel here before 
the existence of the town. To this village those liv- 
ing in the vicinity came for their store supplies, here 
they met on social occasions, here justice courts were 
held, here they often assembled for public worship. 
These social ties and business relations brought these 
neighbors into special mutual sympathy, so that there 
grew up a sort of incipient commonwealth. The town 
centres to which they belonged were many miles dis- 
tant, with poor and hilly roads. Ox carts were the 



HISTORICAL SKETCH. 



11 



principal means of conveyance of freig^lit and persons, 
horse wagons at that time being scarcely known. 
The law requu-ed the payment of a ministerial or 
parish tax, and, I think, made attendance upon public 
worship a certain number of days a year obligatory. 
These requirements caused discontent and on account 
of the isolated condition of the people seemed almost 
oppressive. 

On June 9th, 1708, Stephen Johnson, Benjamin 
Woodward, Joseph Doubleday, Ebenezer Whittemore, 
Joel Amsden, Jeremiah Sil)ley, Abijah Sibley, Thomas 
Stimpson, Calvin Bryant, Jacob AVhipple, Jonathan 
Parkhurst and some others, inhabitants of Hardwick ; 
Thomas Amsden, Nathan Smith, Noah Doaue, John 
Partridge, Solomon Woodward and William Bancroft, 
inhabitants of Petersham in the County of AVorcester, 
and John Towne, Jr., Sanuiel Liscomb, Jonathan Bab- 
bitt, Thaddeus Russell and others, inhal)itants of 
Greenwich, in the County of Hampshire, petitioned 
the General Court to be set off, with their estates, and 
made a new town. I distinctly remember many of 
the petitioners. They set forth in their petition that 
they were inconveniently situated, that long distances 
separated them from their respective town centres 
where town business was dcme, where records were 
kept, and where they must do military duty ; that 



12 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

they had to travel great distances to meeting-houses, 
schools, etc., on hilly roads ; and that their business 
was chiefly done at this place. No name seems to 
have been decided upon for the new town. This 
petition was presented and referred to the senate 
committee on the incorporation of towns on the 
twenty-first day of June, 1798, and concurred in 
by the house. Samuel Phillips was president of 
the senate, and Edward H. Robbins sjDeaker of the 
house. 

It appears from the record that it was not all 
smooth sailing for these petitioners. Many within 
the limits of the proposed new town opj^osed its 
creation, and several remonstrances were presented 
to the General Court. The chief reason given for 
opijosition was the fear that taxes would be increased 
for building a meeting-house, new roads, etc. One 
remonstrance, dated May 6, 1799, nearly a year after 
the presentation of the j^etition, was signed by Samuel 
Morse, Stephen King, Jairus Williams, Caleb Cham- 
berlain, George Hatstat and Elisha Sibley. There 
were several other remonstrances by inhabitants upon 
the territory which belonged to Petersham. 

During the session of the General Court of 1800, 
several petitions were jn-esented to the legislature 
signed by former remonstrants, praying to be in- 



HISTORICAL SKETCH. 13 

eluded with their estates within the Hmits of the new 
town. They stated in their petition that they had 
remonstrated, but that upon more mature considera- 
tion of the matter they had become convinced that it 
would be for their interest that the new town be in- 
corporated, and they desired to be included. One of 
these petitions was dated in June, 1800, and signed 
by Stephen King, William Bancroft, Bazelial Amsden 
and Elisha Sibley. Another was presented about the 
same time, made by Seth Williams of Petersham, 
desiring to be included with his estate in the new 
town. A Uttle later David Stowell petitioned, and on 
January 26th, 1801, Samuel Morse, Jairus Williams 
and Bazelial Amsden of Petersham petitioned to be 
included, with theii- estates. All of these petitioners 
had j)reviou8ly remonstrated. Soon afterward a peti- 
tion signed by all the remonstrants was presented. 

All the petitions and remonstrances were referred 
to the committee on towns, and finally on the 18th of 
February, 1801, the act incorporating the town of 
Dana was passed and approved by Governor Caleb 
Strong. The last section of the act provides "that 
Daniel Bigelow, Esquii-e, of Petersham, be, and he is 
hereby, authorized to issue a warrant directed to some 
suitable inhabitant of said town of Dana, requii-ing 
him to notify the inhabitants thereof to meet at such 



14 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

time and place as sliall be appointed in said warrant, 
for the election of all snch officers as towns are en- 
titled to choose in the months of March or Ajjril, 
annually." 

As to the name of the town, why it was named 
Dana is not entirely clear. I have been unable to 
find anything in the archives of the town, or at the 
secretary of state's office, which throws any lig-ht upon 
it. It has been supposed or assumed that Judge 
Francis Dana assisted the petitioners in obtaining 
favorable legislation, but of this no evidence seems 
to exist. He was not in a position to do so, being 
then chief justice of the supreme judicial court of 
Massachusetts, which position he had held many 
years, and such action Avould be inconsistent, at least, 
with the dignity of his position. 

The writer remembers many incidents of the early 
history of the town, as related by his honored grand- 
father, who was a contemporary and i^articiiiated in 
these proceedings, and was a petitioner for the incor- 
poration of the town, and also as related by his 
father, then quite young. Judge Dana was one of 
the ablest and most distinguished men of the state or 
nation. He had held some of the most ini2)ortant 
offices and jjositions of trust in the state, and under 
the federal government, such as congressman, min- 



HISTOraCAL SKETCH. 15 

ister to foreign countries, etc., and at that time was 
chief justice of the supreme judicial court of Mas- 
sachusetts. He was extreiuely popular with the 
federalists, and his name was urged h\ uiembers of 
that party as the name of the town. This was dis- 
tasteful to some of the democrats, who desired the 
name of some distinguished ]nan of their party. 
Much discussion was indulged iu, in puljlic and 
private. AVhat is singular and inexplicable about it 
is the fact that Dana was chosen as the name of the 
town, while Judge Dana was a federalist, and the 
town was democratic by at least three to one, as 
shown l)y the record of votes Jit that time, and for 
njany years thereafter. From this it must be assumed 
that Judge Dana was held in high esteem by both 
political parties in the tov»-n. 8ince then eight other 
nuinicipalities in the United States have adopted that 
name, to wit : One each in Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, 
IoA\a, Kansas, Missouri, North Carolina, and Wyom- 
ing. What led to the adoption of this name by those 
distant places is unknown, but for the jiurpose of this 
occasion we will assume that iu some way or other a 
knowledge of this place had reached them, and that 
they determined to wisely follow a distinguished 
examjile. 

The record sars : " The inhal^itants of the town of 



IG DANA CENTENMIAL, 

Daua, at a legal town meeting- held in said town on 
Tuesday, the seventeenth day of March, 1801, Daniel 
Bigelow, Esquire, of Petersham, appeared agreeably 
to the act of incorporation of said town and opened 
the meeting according to legal warning. Voted and 
chose Jacob WhijDple, moderator. Voted and chose 
Joel Arasden, town clerk. Voted and chose Stej^hen 
Johnson, Bazeliel Amsden and Jacob Whii:)i)le, select- 
men. Voted and chose John Town, Jr., Joseph Hen- 
dricks, Nathan Smith, and Thomas Tamplin, assessors, 
with all the other various town officers, among them 
Elkanah Haskius, and Philip Covill ty thing men." 
This meeting was adjourned to April Gth. The sum 
of $175 was raised for the support of schools, to be 
divided among the several school districts, one-half 
by the number of pupils, and one-half by the value 
of their estates. A committee was chosen to divide 
the town into school districts, Avhich afterwards re- 
ported, and five districts were made. It was voted 
to allow swine to run at large if yoked and rung, and 
horses if fettered. 

There are many town orders to be found among 
the early records. To show the changes which have 
been made, I will name a few of them : One to pay 
Lydia Chamberlain for teaching school in district No. 
five (North Daua), eight weeks, at five and sixjience 



HISTORICAL SKETCH. 17 

j)er week, S7.34 ; one to pay Samuel Smith for board- 
ing school teacher eight weeks, at five shillings j^er 
week (this was in 1815) ; one to Nathaniel Williams 
for boarding school teacher eight weeks, at eighty 
cents per w^eek, in 1814 ; one to pay Sally Stimpson 
for keeping school in the fourth district, eight weeks, 
at five shillings per week, $6.G7. 

There was also an order to pay Ephraim Whipple 
for a pair of shoes furnished to Eunice Pratt, a 
pauj^er. It is believed that this is the celebrated 
Mrs. Pratt, who was kidnapped or carried off many 
years before by Indians into Canada, and held in 
captivity several years. She finally succeeded in 
gaining her freedom under the most trying circum- 
stances, after endimng great hardship, and found her 
way to this place, where she died at a very advanced 
age. I have not before me a comj^lete history of the 
life and experiences of this remarkable woman. When 
I was a boy she was the subject of a household story.* 

I found an order on the treasurer to pay Elkanah 
Haskins $1.33 for two days' work at making cart- 
ridges for "Regimental muster; " one to pay Stejjhen 



*A more detalleil account of this woman and lier sufferings and 
experiences may be found in the history of this town, written by 
George W. Horr, E^iquire, and published in the history of M'orces- 
ter County in 1879, to which 1 acknowledge my indebtedness for 
many items of interest in the preparation of this sketch. 

2 



18 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

Johuson for wood furnished a schoolhouse at uiuety- 
eight cents per cord ; one to pay Elkanah Haskins for 
boarding the school mistress at fifty cents per week ; 
one to Clarissa Gallond for teaching school at five and 
sixpence jyer week (this was in 1820). Jacob Ams- 
den was jmid $1.95 for the privilege of collecting 
taxes for 1804. The collecting of the taxes was for 
many years after this put up at auction with the office 
of constable at town meeting, and from four to fifteen 
dollars was paid for the office. In these early times 
only those could vote who were twenty-one years of 
age or upward, and had a freehold estate in the Com- 
monwealth of the annual income of three pounds, or 
an estate to the value of sixty pounds. 

Town meetings were generally held in the meeting- 
house, but sometimes were held in the house now 
owned by Mr. Murray Flagg, which was then a tav- 
ern; sometimes in the old tavern hall kept by one 
Day, and by Major Amsden ; also in the Woods house 
on the plain, and sometimes in the house now owned 
by EoUiu N. Doubleday, then called the Hendricks 
23lace. 

In 1819, at a town meeting held at the house of 
Justus Woods, there was an article in the warrant to 
see if the town would provide a workhouse, meaning, 
I suppose, what we now call an almshouse. It was 



HISTORICAL SKETCH. 19 

rejected. At this meeting it was voted to provide 
soldiers with powder and ball for May traiuiug. A 
committee was chosen to draw a plan for a bridge, 
and to superintend its building near the factory frame. 
It seems that as long ago as 1819 the matter of 
asking for an accession to the town's territory on the 
east was agitated. In that year this article was in 
the town warrant : 

"To see if the town will accept of certain inhabit- 
ants from Petersham and Hardwick, and fix the 
centre at the meeting-house." 

It was the custom in those days for towns to own 
a meeting-house, and support the preaching of the 
gospel. The house, being owned by the town, was 
also used for town purj^oses, town meetings being 
held in it. It was generally the only place in town 
in which to hold any public meetings or assemblies. 
The place chosen was generally as near the geo- 
graphical center as possible, and it became the real 
business center. 

In the early history of the town, this village (Dana 
Center) was the only place of business in the town, 
the only place which contained any public buildings. 
Here stood the old Baptist meeting-house (which wHl 
be noticed later), here was a store, a tavern, a tan- 
nery, a blacksmith's shop, a potash manufactory. It 



20 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

became the real center for jDractical purposes, although 
almost at the extreme eastern part of the town. 

There existed from the first a feeling that the pub- 
lic buildings should be located nearer the geographi- 
cal centre of the town, and that a meeting-house, — 
and if practicable a town house, — should be erected, 
and had it not been that the old Baptist structure 
stood here, probably a meeting-house would have 
been built by the town at an early day. Many times 
an article aj^peared in the warrants for toAvn meetings, 
to see if the town would build a meeting-house. On 
more than one occasion committees were chosen by 
the town to fix a location for a meeting-house, and 
sometimes a site for a town house. Either the places 
reported by the committees were unsatisfactory, or 
the town felt too poor to build when no pressing 
necessity existed. In 1817 the town chose a com- 
mittee to see what the meeting-house could be j)ur- 
chased for. The committee reported that some of 
the proprietors would not relinquish their rights in 
the house for any consideration whatever. In 1818 
it was voted in town meeting to build a town house 
near the geographical centre of the town, and a com- 
mittee was chosen to fix a location. The committee 
recommended a place not far from the Woods house 
as the most central and desu'able. This report the 



HISTORICAL SKETCH. 



21 



town rejected, and the vote to build a town house was 
rescinded. The old meeting-house was an apology 
for one, and Avas made to answer the purj^ose. If too 
cold, as there were no conveniences for heating it, 
the tavern hall was resorted to, where the voters were 
warmly welcomed and received ardent hospitality. 

The old Skinner hill has stood as a barrier between 
the northerly and southerly sections of the town, and 
has in a large degree prevented that free communi- 
cation and transit which otherwise wovild doubtless 
have existed ; this has been detrimental to the town's 
harmony and prosperity. Inasmuch as the eternal 
hills could not be removed, it has been, as it were, a 
great "gulf fixed," so that they who would could 
not pass without surmounting difficulties. Although 
a large accession of territory and inhabitants were 
acquired by the town in 1842, which strengthened it 
materially on the east and south, this did not establish 
harmony. For many years there were dissensions, 
contentions, and sectional strife in town meetings, and 
in public affairs generally, the two sections long being 
about equally divided in voting strength ; but since 
the railroad was built through the north village, busi- 
ness there has constantly increased under vigorous 
and enterprising management, so that its ascendency 
seems now to be assured. 



22 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

The subject of the division of "Worcester County, 
which has been agitated in recent years, seems to 
have had an ancient origin. In 1802 Stephen John- 
son was chosen by the town a delegate to attend a 
convention to be held in Gardner " for the purpose of 
CDnsulting upon the matter of the division of Wor- 
cester county." 

A petition, dated the twelfth day of February, 
1839, made by Silas Johnson, Silas N. Johnson, Ste- 
phen Hillman, George Hatstat, Silas Flagg, F. S. 
Rogers, Thomas Haskins, Thomas Aldrich, Zemira F. 
Shumway, Nathaniel Brimhall, William Smith, Perez 
Chipman, Thomas W. Comee, Silas J. Carter and Asa 
Hoyt, being inhabitants of Petersham and Hardwick, 
praying to be annexed to Dana. They stated as their 
reason their proximity to Dana Center, where the 
town business was transacted, their great distance 
from schools, from their own town centres, etc. This 
petition was presented to the legislature by Italy 
Foster, an influential citizen, and a representative to 
the General Court from this town. This was stub- 
bornly opposed by Petersham, and many legislative 
hearings were held. The writer vividly remembers 
the sitting of a legislative sub-committee in the old 
tavern hall here, which heard the petitioners and 
remonstrants, Petersham being represented by the 



HISTORICAL SKETCH. 23 

late Col. Jared Weed, an honored citizen of that 
town and well known throughout the county, who 
discharged the duties of his liosition with great 
ability. 

The act annexing certain tei-ritory and inhabitants 
of Petersham and Hardwick, to Dana, was approved 
February 4, 1842. A town meeting was held in 
December, 1840, to see if the town would receive 
certain territory and inhabitants of Prescott, upon 
petition of Stephen Powers and others. The vote 
was declared to be unanimously in the affirmative. 
It was, however, rejected by the legislature. 

Many years before the incorporation of this town 
there was a meeting-house, which has before been 
alluded to, standing in the south part of Petersham, 
in or near what is now known as Nichewaug. It 
was used by the Baptists as a place of worship. This 
edifice is said to have been taken from the west part 
of that town at some former time. Some of the 
members of this Baptist church lived in that part 
of Petersham which, by the creation of the new town, 
subsequently became a part of Dana. This church 
edifice was moved to this village, and stood a few 
rods westerly from the present town house. This 
happened many years before the creation of this 
town, but its exact date cannot now be fixed. When 



24 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

this change took place, the structiu'e was purchased 
by individuals called proprietors, and it continued to 
be used by the Baptists after its removal, many or all 
of its former members continuing their membership 
in the changed location. Soon afterward the strength 
of the denomination here began to wane, and other 
denominations were allowed to use the house occa- 
sionally. A story used to be told in this connection. 
Delegates from other Baptist churches were to meet 
here upon a certain day. A venerable member, after 
the Sunday service, announced the }neeting and said : 
"The alligators will dine at my house." I have a 
veiy clear remembrance of many of the members who 
resided here, and of some of those in Petersham. It 
may not be improjier or uninteresting to recall the 
names of a few of those whom I once knew. Prob- 
ably there are others present who knew them. There 
were Elkanah Rogers, Jonathan Parkhiu'st, Abijah 
Sibley, Calvin Bryant, Benjamin Skinner, George 
Bosworth, and one Deacon Peckham — all excellent 
men. 

Here in this house, the migrations of which I have 
described, the celebrated Hosea Ballovi first began to 
proclaim the doctrines of universal salvation. His 
biographer says he was a settled minister in Dana 
from 1794 to 1802. He came to this place to teach 



HISTORICAL SKETCH. 25 

school, and liere began his clerical labors in connec- 
tion with school teaching. 

This house was often used by the town. Town 
meetings were often held in it for many years. 
Probably this was the jmucipal reason why the town 
never built a meeting-house ; no necessity requii-ed 
it. The Baptist organization finally became extinct. 
Its members scattered, some going to Petersham, 
and some to the south jjart of Hardwick, and per- 
haps to other j)laces, for religious facilities. 

It seems that the town did maintain religious wor- 
shijj. The records show that Elder Jacob Whipple, 
the father of Ei3hraim Whipple, Esquii-e, whom many 
here probably well remember, was hired by the town, 
mone}' being approjiriated for his salary. On one 
occasion a committee was aj^pointed in town meeting 
to confer with Elder Whipple as to his salary, which 
afterward reported that he would preach that year 
without expense to the town, and depend entirely 
upon the chanty of the people for compensation. 
Elder Burt of Hardwick was sometimes hired. In 
1821 Elder Pease was installed as pastor by the 
town, and preached here two years or more. He was 
a very zealous man, had many adherents, and was 
successful. One Grossman preceded Elder Pease. 
He was an enthusiastic man, and preached the doc- 



26 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

trines of a sect calling themselves Christians. He 
continued to jsreach in this vicinity about two years, 
and made many converts. After he left most of his 
adherents scattered and joined other religious organ- 
izations. I very well remember some of his early 
converts. 

In 1823 money was raised by the town for the 
preaching of the gosj^el, but it was to be divided 
among the different denominations, and persons rep- 
resenting the different sects were appointed to make 
the distribution. Thereafter the house was used by 
various denominations. The Keverend Joshua Flagg, 
John Willis, Gerard Bushnell, James Babbitt, Mas- 
sena Ballou and other Universalists, and Elder Jones 
and Elder Burt and other Baptists, have occupied the 
pulpit in the old meeting-house. In 1845 the town 
jDurchased the meeting-house of the heirs of the 
l^roj^rietors and moved it to its present location, and 
converted it into a town hall as it now stands a few 
rods east of this tent, some alterations having been 
made. 

In 1832, through the zeal and determined efforts 
of Deacon Abraham Haskell, a worthy citizen of 
Petersham, the Congregationalists of the south part 
of that .town, the west j)art of Barre, the north part 
of Hardwick, and of Dana, formed a society and built 



HISTORICAL SKETCH. 



27 



a house of worship in what was known as Storrsville, 
a small village about one mile east of Dana Centre, 
then part of Petersham, but in 1842 was annexed to 
Dana. It is said that the late Dr. Storrs of New 
Braintree was influential in estabHshing this church, 
and in jirocuring for it missionary aid. It had a 
continuous existence of about twenty years, when, 
for want of sufficient support, many of its members 
became scattered and it ceased to exist. The building 
was sold and taken to Brookfield for a shop. This 
church was presided over by several very excellent 
pastors, among whom were Kev. James C. Houghton 
and the Reverend John Keep. Mr. Keep had his 
home in this village about seventeen years, and was 
beloved as a pastor and citizen, having the principal 
care of the schools in town many years. 

About the time of the discontinuance of the Storrs- 
ville church in 1852, a Congregational church and 
society were organized in this place, and two years 
later the present church edifice was erected and fin- 
ished. Mr. Keep was installed as its pastor, and 
continued to labor here more than ten years. There 
being but few who were wilhng to engage in the 
enterprise of building this church edifice, it was done 
through the great efforts and sacrifices of a few citi- 
zens, one of whom was Mr. Theodore W. Johnson, late 



28 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

of Worcester, then an honored and leading citizen of 
this town, who had held all the important offices of 
the town in a satisfactory manner. Silas N. Johnson, 
Nathaniel Johnson, Isaac Doane, Solomon Blackmer, 
Timothy Stone, James S. Brown and others gave 
substantial aid. 

In its early history there was no permanent place 
of jxiblic worship in the northerly part of this town, 
including the present growing village of North Dana, 
then quite thinly inhabited. Meetings were held by 
the Methodists in schoolhouses and often in dwell- 
ings. The Woods house on the plain was frequently 
resorted to as a place of worship. In or about 1840 
a strong desire was felt by the inhabitants in that 
vicinity that a more jDermanent and convenient place 
of public worship should be furnished. No one sect 
or denomination alone being able to build and sup- 
port a church, the inhabitants in that vicinity — those 
having any or no religious j^roclivities, as well as pro- 
fessors of religion, — became interested, and for the 
public good contributed to its building. Mr. Elias 
Stone, a jjrominent citizen of that part of the town, 
and one of the largest land owners in the town, was 
perhaps the most liberal contributor, although not a 
member oi any church. He was the father of the 
late Daniel Stone, Esquire, who was until his death a 



HISTORICAL SKETCH. 29 

pillar in the Methodist church there, and a worthy 
and influential citizen, twice a representative to the 
General Court from this town. 

The meeting-house being built and owned by per- 
sons having various religiotis faiths (pew-holders con- 
trolling), each had his natural and legal rights to its 
use. Experience has abundantly shown that this kind 
of union is not an unmixed blessing, and this instance 
has been no exception to the rule. 

The Methodists had an organization and were the 
most numerous, still they shared with the Universal- 
ists in the use of the house for many years. In other 
than church matters this would ajipear like setting 
up pins to be knocked down. This state of things 
continued with varying success until 1899, when the 
Methodists piu'chased the interest of the other pro- 
prietors, or pew owners, made thorough repau's upon 
the edifice, and now the Methodist church is in suc- 
cessful oiDeration. The Universal ists, although not 
continuously supi>orting regular religious services, 
have from the earliest history of the town's existence 
had some sort of organization, with some interrup- 
tions or susioensions. In 1898 that society buUt a 
beautiful and commodious church- edifice in the vil- 
lage of North Dana, in which public worship is being 
regularly maintained and the society is now in a pros- 



30 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

perous condition. It will be seen that the jDCOj^le of 
this town, although they may not be distinguished for 
their piety, are abundantly supplied with ecclesiasti- 
cal and religious facilities. With a little less than 800 
inhabitants, there are three organized churches in 
active operation. 

This was almost exclusively a farming town, and 
agriculture still continues to employ the labor of a 
large proportion of the inhabitants. Much of the soil 
is light, and has become so exhausted as to make its 
cultivation uni-emunerative, and is abandoned for that 
purpose. For more than sixty years this process of 
abandonment has been going on, until forests abound. 
Much of the land once cultivated has grown to j^ine 
and other timber, so that a thriving business has been 
done in lumber during the last twenty years. This is 
also true of the adjoining towns. This state of things 
has led to the decadence of rural towns, better oppor- 
tunities being offered to the young in the fertile Avest 
and in manufacturing centres. At a very early period 
in the history of this town, and probably long before 
its birth, potash was made from ashes near this place, 
cider was distilled and cider brandy (which probably 
found a ready market) was made within a few rods of 
where we now are, by Apollos Johnson, in the early 
part of the last century. Tanning and currying was 



HISTORICAL i-KETCH. 31 

carried ou by Warreu White, afterwards by Italy 
Foster and Apollos Johiisou in counectiou with 
pocket-book making. 

From 18(50 to 1872 palm leaf Shaker hoods were 
made in this place, several hundred hands being em- 
ployed in weaving the palm leaf and making it into 
hoods. Wagon making was at one time carried on in 
the east part of the town. About seventy years ago 
palm leaf was introduced into this and adjacent towns, 
and finally spread into the western part of the state, 
and into Verinout and New Hampshire. It was made 
into hats here. This furnished remunerative employ- 
ment for a large part of the women and children in 
braiding them at their homes in this and neighboring- 
towns for more than iifty years, and the business is 
still carried on to quite a large extent by The H. W. 
Goodman Co. at North Dana. For many years there 
were probably sixty thousand dollars' worth of palm 
leaf hats put into the market in a finished state, 
yearly, from this town, and at one time Shaker hoods 
were made from palm leaf in this town of at least an 
equal amount. Since about 1880 the imlni leaf busi- 
ness has declined. Straw braid, imported chieiiy from 
China, and made into hats at a much lower price than 
they can be made from palm leaf, has to a large extent 
supplanted the palm leaf business. In 1855 a large 



32 DAN\ CENTENNIAL. 

steam mill was built in this village, and occupied by 
Z. W. and J. S. Brown for making pails, sawing lum- 
ber and grinding grain. It was destroyed hj fire 
about six years later and was a total loss, being unin- 
sured. Owing to the want of means of transjiortation 
by railroad, and other facilities, business in this j^art 
of the town (the east) is confined to local trade. 

Tradition says that in about 1812 Thomas Stimpson 
built a sawmill on the west side of Swift river at what 
is now North Dana, in which business was done sev- 
eral years, and vipon the east side of the river he 
erected a frame for a large factory building. Being 
somewhat optimistic, he expected some manufacturer, 
or wealthy company, would utilize the water power 
and plant a large business there. The damaging 
effect on business caused by the war with Great 
Britain was so great that no capital responded as he 
had hoped. This frame stood many years and finally 
rotted down. It was sometimes called " Stimpson's 
folly." 

Mr. Stimpson was an enterprising man, and it seems 
he had prophetic visions, but owing to his excessive 
optimism he was too "j)revious." In a little inore 
than a quarter of a century later the thrifty village of 
North Dana was planted here. 

About 1830 Daniel Stone, before mentioned, became 



HISTORICAL SKETCH. ' 33. 

the owner of this water privilege, rebuilt the old saw- 
mill, and built a grist mill upon the east side of the 
river, upon or near the site of Mr. Stimpson's factory 
frame, secured flowage rights, and carried on business 
there until about 1840, when he sold his mill and 
water privilege to Warren Hale and Allen Goodman, 
who had invented machinery and obtained a patent 
right for turning u-regular forms. With their im- 
j)roved and labor-saving machinery they manufac- 
tured pianaforte legs with gi-eat success. These legs 
were made and veneered at their factory, transported 
by teams to Palmer and consigned to parties in dis- 
tant cities. This business was continued until about 
1873. Many changes were made during its continu- 
ance, by the admission of new partners and the erec- 
tion of new buildings. The business of making 
picture frames was at one time added. In 185G their 
principal factory Avas burnt. The following year a 
more commodious building was erected and equipped 
with improved machinery, invented chiefly by Mr. 
Allen Goodman. In or about 1850 Mr. Warren Hale 
withdrew his interest and established a business in 
Philadelphia, which he j^rosecuted until his death a 
few years ago. He left two sons, who are now in 
active business in that city. North Dana was visited 
four times with disastrous fires within about twenty 



34 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

years, each one destroying some valuable factory build- 
ings, and much stock, machinery, and other personal 
property, but in every instance they were rebuilt. 

About 1880 Lorenzo Hale, Allen W. Goodman, and 
one Schofield converted one of these factory build- 
ings into a satinet manufactory and continued that 
business a short time. In or about 1896 this property 
was jjurchased by Crawford and Tyler, who have 
vigorous^.y and very successfully carried on the busi- 
ness of manufacturing cloth to the present time, 
emj)loying thirty or more hands. 

About ten years ago Henry W. Goodman & Co., 
who had been several years engaged in manufactur- 
ing palm leaf hats, supplemented that business by the 
manufacture of straw braid hats, erecting new build- 
ings and putting in new machinery. The business 
grew steadily, and in 1898 a corporation was formed 
under the name and style of The H. W. Goodman 
Co., which is doing a large and successful business, 
employing one hundred and forty hands. 

About ten years ago John Stowell established the 
business of manufacturing boxes, and built a factory 
near the railroad depot. He continued the industry 
until about two years ago, when Mr. George Blodgett 
purchased the plant. The business now employs 
thirty or more men. 



HISTORICAL SKETCH. 



35 



In 187G a lai"ge buildiuf^- was erected by the Good 
Temijlars near the de^Dot at North Dana, which is not 
only used by that organization, but also for various 
23ublic purj^oses, sometimes by the town for town 
meetings, sometimes by the Gartield lodge of 
Grangers, and for other public meetings. Within 
the last twenty years the Mount Ell Hotel and 
twenty-seven dwellings have been built at North 
Dana, and many improvements and additions to fac- 
tories have been there made. The railroad which 
j^asses through North Dana was completed in 1873 
and has since been an important factor in its growth. 
A plant for lighting the village by electricity was 
established in 189G. 

Pautapaug 2>oud, a large and beautiful sheet of 
water, less than one and a half miles south of this 
2)lace (Dana Centre), has from the time the memory 
of man runneth not to the contrary been more or less 
a resort for fishermen and j^leasure seekers. TJj^on 
the east side of this j^ond, or lake, and near the home- 
stead of the late Silas Johnson (one of the oldest 
settlers ujjon the territory now Dana, w^hose home- 
stead was occujiied by his descendants for three 
generations, and some of the fifth generation de- 
scended from him are with us to-day.) there is a 
beautiful grove containing sixty acres, now owned by 



36 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

Col. Theodore S. Johnson of Worcester, who belongs 
to the fourth generation from Silas, the original 
settler. He has recently improved and beautified 
this grove, erected upon it a commodious building, 
and constructed a wharf or landing for boats, etc., 
making it one of the most desirable resorts of the 
kind in this part of the state for fishing and pleasure. 

A short distance from the railroad depot at North 
Dana Mr. George E. Gleason has a pavillion situated 
upon a large pond or several connected ponds, extend- 
ing, it is said, nearly three miles, which is very pro- 
lific of fish of the various fresh water species. This 
has become cpiite a famous and very attractive resort 
not only for fishermen, but for picnic parties and 
jDleasure seekers generally. 

The inhabitants of the territory now Dana have 
always been a law abiding and patriotic people. 
There are good reasons to assume that they furnished 
their full quota of soldiers in the Revolutionary war, 
although reliable records cannot now be found, as that 
war -WAS fought before the birth of this town. It is, 
however, certain that Jonathan Parkhurst, John 
Towne, Stephen Johnson, Stephen Witt, Benjamin 
Richardson, Bazelieh Amsdeu, Rviggles Sj^ooner, 
Thomas Stimpson, Elijah Babbitt, Benjamin Skinner, 
and, I think, several others, did service in that war. 



HISTORICAL SKETCH. 37 

Most of those named I personally remember, and I 
know that five of them, at least, were pensioners. 
Elisha Foster, wljo last dwelt upon Dana " Common," 
and is probably well remembered by many present, 
held a captain's commission and commanded a com- 
pany in the last war with Great Britain. Asa Hoyt 
was a pensioner for service in that war. Joseph 
Simonds also did service, and there were several 
others. 

It is said that Daniel Shays, the leader of the re- 
bellion in this state in 1786-1787, camped with his 
army about one-quai'ter of a mile west of this place 
(Dana Centre). However that may be, he must have 
passed through it on his route from Springfield to 
Petersham, where his army was routed by Greneral 
Lincoln and many prisoners taken. An incident was 
related in this connection. "When, many years after 
the Revolution, soldiers began to make application for 
pensions, it was said that Elisha Silbey presented his 
claim for a pension. When asked who the colonel of 
his regiment was, he hesitated, but finally said, as he 
remembered it, "It was Shays." It is not known 
that he succeeded. 

This town furnished eighty-eight men for the War 
of the Eebellion, thii-teen more than its fuU quota, 
and thii'teen citizens of Dana were eni'olled in the 



38 



DANA CENTENNIAL. 



army credited to other j^laces. Of those eighty-eight 
men who went into active service, four were kiUed, 
and fourteen died of disease or wounds while on 
duty. The town's war expenses were about $9000. 

The town is now free from debt. In 1860 there 
were 824 inhabitants in the town. From causes 
which brought about the depletion or decadence of 
most of the rural towns in the central and western 
part of the state, it fell to 695 in 1890. By the last 
census there are now 790, showing an increase of 
about fifteen j^er cent during the last decade. 

This town has raised many good, true and useful 
men. Some bave gone from it into cities and distant 
states, where they have occujiied and still are occu- 
jjying positions of trust and large responsibility. I 
have scarcely mentioned the living ; their history is 
not i^erfected and cannot be written. As to the 
moral standing of its inhabitants, it is safe to venture 
the opinion that in the general jiublic judgment it 
will not suffer in comparison with that of the inhabi- 
tants of other towns. I have found no record of any 
representative to the General Court from this town 
until 1810. Since that time twenty citizens have 
served in the lower branch of the Legislature, a 
number of them several times each, and one has 
served in the uj^per branch. I jjersonally remember 



HISTORICAL SKETCH. 



39 



all of them. In 1835 when Nathaniel Johnson was 
elected a representative, the record says, "It was 
voted that Nathaniel Johnson pay ten dollars into 
the town treasury instead of treating, as has been 
the custom." This custom was followed several 
years. Strange as it may now seem, rum, or other 
intoxicating hquors, was a common beverage here as 
everywhere down to about 1840, when temperance 
began to be agitated, and Washingtonian societies 
were formed. No man on any social or business 
occasion was regarded as treated with decent civility, 
unless rum or other liquor, was freely furnished ; and 
such was the standard of ethics at that time that the 
clergy, then more conspicuous leaders in society than 
now, were by no means exceptions in this respect. 
When I was a boy a clerg^mian of the Calvinistic 
persuasion, who resided more than ten miles distant, 
sometimes came to my father's house on Saturday to 
preach in the old meeting-house the next day. Im- 
mediately on his arrival the jug was examined, and if 
the quantity on hand was deemed insufficient to last 
during his visit, I was at once hastened to the store 
to replenish the stock. If it sometimes happened 
that the utterances from the pulpit were not so dis- 
tinct in the afternoon (after the parson had dined at 
the hotel or with some friend) as in the forenoon, or 



40 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

if the impressions left upon the minds of the hearers 
were a Kttle confused, it was regarded as a mere acci- 
dent or incident liable at any time to occur, and was 
entirely overlooked. Since 1840 this has been what 
may be called a dry or temperance town. With a 
few exceptions in recent years, no licenses have been 
given for the sale of liquor for more than half a 
century. 

As we have seen, the opportunities for common 
school education were, in the early history of the 
town, of the most meager kind. Ten or fifteen weeks 
a year constituted the length of schools, generally 
with poorly equipped teachers when compared with 
those of the present time ; cold houses heated only 
by fireplaces wide enough to receive four foot wood ; 
boys often attending the six weeks' winter school 
until they had passed their minority. Now the town 
provides, nine months of public school for each pupil, 
transporting to and from school those who live at a 
long distance away, furnishing all the text books and 
the most modern appliances to the schoolrooms. The 
town, being too small to suj^port a high school, jjays 
the tuition of all who desire high school privileges in 
such schools in other towns. In 1892 a town library 
was established which now contains nearly two thou- 
sand volumes. 



HISTORICAL SKETCH. 



41 



111 view of the scanty facilities for common school 
education formerly supplied, it may be pertinently 
asked : Is there not danger that the modern system 
and practice of making the acquirement of knowledge 
or the rudiments of education so easy as to requu-e 
but very little mental effort, may tend to cultivate 
indolence, so that what is received will not be retained 
and cannot be applied, and mental dissipation and 
easy-going habits ensue? 

I cannot leave this sketch without departing from 
my purpose of not alluding directly to the living, but 
what I am about to say is of so extraordinary a char- 
acter that I may -be pardoned for the digression. 
Mr. David L. Richards, who has long been a worthy 
and much respected citizen of this town, and who is 
still in active service, has been forty times elected 
town clerk without opposition, and has forty con- 
secutive years served the town in that capacity with- 
out a breath of complaint ; and it may not be out of 
place here to say, that the "Captain" was the first to 
suggest the holding of this celebration, and has ren- 
dered efficient aid in its preparation. 

I have already taken too much of your time. I 
have not attempted to give a full history of the town, 
but only a mere sketch of some matters connecting 
the past with the present ; more than this time would 



42 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

not permit, nor would courtesy to our orator allow. 

Fellow townsmen, let us not forget that we are the 
successors of our ancestors, or of those who have pre- 
ceded us. The responsibilities and burdens have 
fallen ujjon this generation. True patriotism begins 
at the home. We are told " If a man knows not how 
to rule his own house how shall he take care of the 
Church of God?" No man can be a true patriot in 
any proper sense, if he has no regard and affection 
for his home, the place of his nativity or adoption. 
The character of any place is measured by the 
average character of the citizens composing it. It 
is not nvimbers alone that give a -town its character, 
nor always its importance. We are but a short link 
in the connected chain, the events of which we call 
history. Let us see to it that the mantle cast upon 
us goes to posterity untarnished and unimjiaired. 



ORATIOI^ 

By Richard H. Dana, Esq. 



Shakespeare makes Juliet say: — 

"What's in a name? That which we call a rose 
By any other name woulil smell as sweet." 

Yet names, made of only a few common letters, liave 
the magic quality of containing- whole books full and 
whole human lives full of association, history, ideals, 
and insj^ii-ations for better or for worse. We all must 
have thought, for exami:»le, what a priceless treasure 
it is for the peoj^le of the United States to have for 
their national hero a man with such character for 
sound sense, perseverance, self-improvement, truth, 
unselfishness, uprightness, and nobility as Washing- 
ton, and how wise it has been to keep his name and 
character in mind by calling the capital of the country 
and some city in every State and some chief street in 
every city after him ; and, in contrast, how unfortu- 
nate it has been, for example, for the i)eoiDle of France 
to have for their national hero such an abnormal 
genius, so impossiljle to imitate, with such weaknesses 
in character so easy to copy, as Najioleon. 



44 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

If there are such possibilities for good or bad in 
a name, let us see whence and why this town was 
named Dana. In a Worcester County history, pub- 
Hshed in 1879, it was said the town was named after 
Francis Dana, in recognition of his influence in secur- 
ing the act of incorporation. This act, like all acts 
of incorporation, was obtained from the State legisla- 
ture. At the date of the incorporation of this town, 
Francis Dana had not been a member of the State 
legislature or State council for over twenty years; 
moreover, he had been sixteen years one of the judges 
of the Supreme Judicial Court of the Commonwealth, 
and was then, and had for ten years been, its Chief 
Justice. 

Both by the Constitution of Massachusetts and by 
well-established etiquette, it would not have been 
permissible for a judge of this court, still less for its 
Chief Justice, to use his influence on or even appear 
before the legislature in this way. His name does 
not appear ou the official paj^ers preserved in this 
case at the State House, and yet it is not improbable 
that there is just a little foundation for the tradition. 
He may very likely have given unofficially, and as an 
act of kindness, some advice to the representatives of 
the small community then seeking a charter, but per- 
haps hardly able to afford to pay the fees of legisla- 



ORATION. 



45 



tive counsel. Merely to have given some such small 
assistance would alone and of itself not be sufKcient 
ground for calling this town Dana. It is not cus- 
tomary — indeed it is never done, as far as I can 
learn — to christen a town after the attorney who has 
secured its charter. 

Perhaps, then, it may not he inappropriate for me 
to say something of this Francis Dana after whom 
this town is named. It may not be uninteresting to 
the inhabitants and theii- friends and relatives gath- 
ered here to-day at the centennial celebration to know 
something more about him, and to see if there is not 
something in his character and achievements to have 
caused and to justify the adoption of this name beyond 
some small aid in securing its charter, — something to 
be proud of, to be worthy of remembering, to be 
fitting to follow, or to be an inspiration to the inhabi- 
tants and their descendants after them. 

Francis Dana lived in stirring times, such as bring 
out the best that is in men and bring the best men 
out. He was born just before the middle of the cen- 
tury before last, in 1743, aliout the beginning of a 
French and English war on this continent, two years 
before the first romantic siege of Louisburg, and a 
few years before the first settlement in what is now 
Dana. He was fifteen years old at the second siege 



4G DANA CENTENNIAL. 

of Louisburg-, and twenty at the close of another and 
most decisive French and English war in America. 
The first conflict between the British troops and the 
Boston citizens, called the "Boston Massacre," found 
him twenty-seven years of age, at the outbreak of the 
Revolutionary War he was thirty-two, the Declaration 
of Independence was signed when he was thirty-three, 
the Revolution was ended when he was thirty-nine, 
and the Constitution of the United States was adopted 
when he was forty-five. 

Thus he lived, as a bo}' and young man, through 
the wars with the French and Indians, and came of 
age at the beginning of that period of discussion, 
argument, and j^o-ifical and civil strife with the 
mother country which educated the people in the 
principles of self-government and the value of liberty, 
and prepared them for the Revolution; then, as a 
more mature man, through the long Revolution itself ; 
then, as a middle-aged man, through the six years 
which the late John Fiske has called the "critical 
period of American history," which followed the suc- 
cessful issue of the war and came before the ado^Dtion 
of the Constitution, — a j^eriod of unrest, unstable 
government, excitement, and turmoil, of conflict 
between license and law, anarchy and order, in no 
wise better exemplified than by Shays's Rebellion, the 



ORATION. 47 

chief camp of vrhich was about half a mile southwest 
of Dana Common, where we are now gathered ; then 
through the construction period that followed and 
came out of this, in which the Constitutions of the 
United States and of the sei:)arate States were 
adopted, when law and order became established, 
and from which a long period of jjeace, liberty, and 
liros2:)erity ensued. 

During the period of prej^aration for the struggle 
for independence, the time of civil strife between 
the colonies, chiefly Massachusetts and the mother 
country, Francis Dana took no inconsiderable part 
for one so young. This was one of the most import- 
ant e2:)0chs in our history. "Were it not for a full 
discussion and thorough understanding of our rights 
and liberties and the principles on which they were 
founded, the public would easily have been misled 
into accej^ting the plausible concession of details, 
with the retention of real power over us, that Great 
Britain offered ; and the thirteen separate and weak 
colonies would never have become so united in thought 
and purpose as to have resisted the armed action of 
the then most jDowerful nation of the world. Not 
only was this period of discussion and education im- 
portant in our own history, but in the history of 
every free people since. In no one of the free colo- 



48 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

nies of Great Britain to-day, neither in Canada, 
Australia, Gape Colony, nor New Zealand, does Eng- 
land for a moment try to enforce those obnoxious 
measures of restraints on trade, quartering troops on 
peaceful inhabitants, issuing search warrants, trials 
without jury, or taxation without rejjresentation, 
which were the causes for our complaint and resist- 
ance. In our own new possessions, too, if we do not 
grant full freedom and independence, yet we shall be 
forced, by the very principles which were established 
in those days before 1760 and 1775, to grant as 
large a share of self-government and to inflict as few 
restraints as is compatible with peace, order, and 
prosperity in those dejiendencies. 

Francis Dana had sj^ecial advantages and training 
for useful work in those days. His father, Kichard 
Dana, was a leader among the "Sons of Liberty." 
He frequently jDresided at the famous town meetings 
held at Faneuil hall and the Old South Meeting- 
house, and was often on committees with the Ad- 
amses, Otis, Quincy, Hancock, and Warren, prej^aring 
addresses to the j)atriots through the colonies and 
ajijieals to the king and Parliament on the other side 
of the ocean. He was a noted lawyer, sharing with 
Otis the acknowledged leadershij) of the Massachu- 
setts bar, and was professionally consulted by town 



49 



and State g-overuments as to their rights and power. 
He in 17(55 took the affidavit of Andrew Oliver, the 
stamp commissioner, not to enforce the stamp act ; 
and, holding, as he did, a commission of trial justice 
from the crown, he subjected himself to the penalties 
of treason. This Richard Dana, father of Francis, 
died in 1772, just three years before the outbreak of 
of hostilities, at the age of seventy-two. President 
Adams, in later days, speaks of him as one who, had 
he not been cut oft' by death, would have furnished 
one of the immortal names of the Revolution. 

Instructed and inspired by such a father, he had 
also the advantages, like that father, of a Harvard 
College education. For live years Francis Dana 
studied at the law in the office of his maternal imcle, 
Judge Edmund Trowbridge, a celebrated lawyer in 
the colonies, whom Chancellor Kent calls "the oracle 
of the old real law of Massachusetts." Francis came 
to the bar in 17G7, jvist at the height of the civil 
struggle. Early he joined the " Sons of Liberty ; "' 
and John Adams's diary of 17()() speaks of the chib in 
which "Lowell, Dana, Quincy, and other young fel- 
lows were not ill employed in lengthened discussions 
of the rights of taxation." He became an active 
practitioner at the bar, but especially in causes in- 
volving civil and political rights. The death of his 



50 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

father in 1772 left him in possession of a competent 
fortvine, which he i-egarded as only increasing his 
oiDportunities for service in the public cause. In 
1773 he married a daughter of the Hon. William 
EUery, one of the leading Rhode Island patriots, and 
afterward a signer of the Declaration of Independ- 
ence. Such wei'e his training and associations, and 
for applying these to useful work he was not lacking 
in opportunity. 

In 1773, in concert with John Adams, he acted in 
behalf of the Rhode Island j)atriots for the prosecu- 
tion in the matter of Rome's and Moffatt's letters. 
In 1774 he, though one of the youngest members of 
the bar, opposed the complimentary address prepared 
for Governor Hutchiuson on his leaving the country ; 
and this he is said to have done with great courage 
and zeal. 

In the spring of 1774, just a year before the battle 
of Lexington, it became impox'tant to send some one 
to England for the double purpose of representing 
the patriots among their friends in the mother coun- 
try, and of ascertaining the real state of feeling among 
political rulers on the other side. Dana, then scarcely 
thirty-one years of age, was chosen for this purpose. 
He took confidential letters to Dr. Franklin from War- 
ren, the elder Quincy, Dr. Cooper and other leaders. 



51 



Francis's brother, the Rev. Edmund Dana, had gone 
to England, settled there, and married the daughter 
of Lord Kinnau-d, who was also niece of Governor 
Johnstone and of Sir AVilliam Poultney, one of the 
largest land-owners in the midland counties; and 
through them and their connections Francis Dana 
had special opportunities of ascertaining the state of 
English feeling and government policy. He became 
intimate with Dr. Price, and contributed materials 
for the work of that learned doctor, published in 
England in defence of the patriot's cause, — a store- 
house of information much quoted and drawn from 
by our many friends of that time in that country. 
He remained in England thus occuj^ied two years. 
Meanwhile in this country the battles of Lexington 
and Bunker Hill had been fought. We were still in 
the attitude of dejiendent colonies resisting aggres- 
sions on our liberties. The question then, agitating 
the minds of the leaders on this side was whether we 
should continue in the same attitude and still seek to 
adjust our differences with the old country as its 
colonies, or whether we should declare absolute inde- 
pendence. These two years in England had convinced 
Mr. Dana that all hope of any such adjustment on any 
terms which the colonists could accept must be aban- 
doned, and he threw his whole influence zealously in 



52 DAXA CENTENNIAL. 

favor of independence. He returned in April, 1776, 
and impressed his conviction on those who had sent 
him over, on his father-in-law, the Hon. William Ellery, 
and on other members of the Continental Congress ; 
and this opinion, formed in England with such pecu- 
liar advantages for forming one, had its influence in 
inducing the Continental Congress three months after 
his return to issue the great Declaration of Independ- 
ence, July 4, 177 G. Mr. Dana soon after his return 
was himself chosen as a member of that Congress, but 
just too late for him to put his signature to that cele- 
brated document. Besides being a member of Con- 
gress, he was for the next four years by successive 
elections a meinber of the Massachusetts council. 

The next important civil act in our history was the 
adoption of the Articles of Confederation between the 
colonies. As a member of Congress, he took a part 
in this, and set his signature to the articles in July, 
1778. 

But before this civil act, military considerations of 
the gravest importance came before Congress. Early 
in 1778 the cause of the patriots was at a very low 
ebb. To recall these days, it is only necessary for me 
to mention to any American, with even a common- 
school education only, the name "Valley Forge." 
There, as you remember, the remains of our army 



53 



had retired, not ouly defeated, but almost wholly 
demoralized. Many of the colonies had not only 
failed to furnish their quota of troops, but had failed 
to provision and equip those that were still in the 
field. The Continental Congress seemed helpless; 
and there were complaints, jealousies, and murmur- 
ing-s of distrust even of the great Washington. You 
Avill recollect how the Continental soldiers were often 
seen barefoot in the snow, were without adequate 
blankets or tents, were dressed almost in rags, and 
frequently had no proper or sufficient food. Unless 
the ai'my was reorganized, enlarged, and suitably 
supplied, all the political education and wise states- 
manship of those times would have been of no value. 
The Declaration of Independence would not have been 
worth the paper it was written on. These Avere days 
that tried the souls of men. It was no time then 
for merely conferring much-sought-after honors, but 
Congress had to look to its ablest leaders. Mr. Dana 
was one of its youngest members, being only thirty- 
four years of age ; but by his eloquence, combined 
with good legal ability, business judgment, and high 
character, he had made a jjosition for himself. He 
had given some study to military affairs both here 
and abroad, and on his return from England had 
contemplated going into the army. To him at this 



54 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

critical moment Congress turned, and made liini 
chairman of the Committee on the Army, and sent 
him to consult with Washington at Valley Forge. 
There he continued five months of this distressful 
season, engaged with Washington in concerting the 
plans submitted by Congress to the Commander-in- 
chief, July 4, 1778, " to be proceeded in " (as the 
order says) "with the advice and assistance of Mr. 
Reed and Mr. Dana, or either of them." 

From the date of this reorganization the army im- 
proved, and the fortunes of war not long after turned 
in our favor. 

During this same year another vital matter came 
before Congress ; and that was the consideration of 
the Conciliatory Bills, as they were called, of Lord 
North. The English government had sent over a 
peace commission, charged with the duty of urging 
the adoption of these measures. There were all this 
time many colonists with more or less well-defined 
Tory sympathies ; but more potent and more to be 
feared were the many people who had got tired and 
discouraged by the long years of war which, up to 
that time, had in the main resulted in loss and defeat, 
and, added to this, the concessions proposed l)y Lord 
North were not inconsiderable, and must have been 
very alluring to many of the despondent and of the 



ORATION. 55 

conservative business men and property holders. It 
requii'ed keen legal and political training and ability 
to deal adequately with these plausible proposals, and 
enable Congress and the people to thoroughly under- 
stand their true nature. Mr. Dana, then only thirty- 
live years of age, was appointed by Congi-ess one of 
a special committee of thi'ee to consider the svibject ; 
and it was the strong report of this committee that 
caused the rejection of those conciliatory proposals 
in Congi'ess by a unanimous vote. 

Besides these military and civil problems at home, 
Congress had serious concerns abroad. France was 
at war with England, and had taken the part of the 
colonists. Fickle as was this friendship and disap- 
pointing as were the direct results of this assistance 
at many critical times, yet the indii-ect effect of 
France's hostility to England was of al:>solutely vital 
imi)ortance to our success. Had England been at 
peace with all European countries, and been free to 
concentrate all her immense force on regaining the 
thii'teen colonies, the cause of our forefathers would 
have been indeed hopeless. At the same time it was 
thought that, if France continued with us, our recent 
success on the Held of battle might bring Great 
Britain to the point of yielding. Therefore, some 
able and discreet i:)ersons had to be sent to Europe 



56 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

for the dovible purpose of securing the contiiiued 
and active assistance of France and possibly of 
negotiating treaties of j^eace and commerce with 
Great Britain. Mr. Dana was chosen as one of two, 
and was sent with Adams to Paris in 1779, as secre- 
tary of legation with special powers. They found no 
immediate prospect of negotiation with England. 
Meanwhile our goyernment was sorely in need of the 
"sinews of war;" and money loans must be secured 
in Holland and from some of our English sympa- 
thizers. Again on Mr. Dana and Mr. Adams, as his 
senior, was put by Congress this important function. 
Besides the friendship of France, Congress hojied 
to secure the co-operation of Russia, or, failing in 
that, at least to keep Russia in such a position of 
doubt that the uncertainty of her then future course 
might have its weight, with other factors, in turning 
the scales of English thought in favor of acknowledg- 
ing our independence. This delicate mission was in- 
trusted to Mr. Dana alone. He was appointed minis- 
ter to Russia, and proceeded toward St. Petersburg. 
He went by way of Frankfort and Berlin, and arrived 
at the court of Empress Catherine in 1781. To have 
received Mr. Dana in full form as minister plenijio- 
tentiary from the United States would have been, 
in international law, equivalent to the recognition by 



57 



Russia of the indeijeudence of the United States ; 
and this wouhl have been regarded by England as an 
act of war. Though not openly received in due form, 
yet Mr. Dana succeeded in having regular intercourse 
with Count Ostennan, the Russian minister of foreign 
affairs, and in keeping his constant friendship. This, 
while not an open act at which England could take 
offence, was still known to her minister at St. Peters- 
burg, and by him communicated to the ministry and 
■Pai'liament. All this time Mr. Dana was in constant 
correspondence with Congress, with the Marquis de 
Verac, the French minister at St. Petersburg, with 
Mr. Robert P. Livingstone, whom Congi-ess had ap- 
pointed secretary of foreign affairs, and with Mr. 
Adams. 

He succeeded thus in the main object of his mis- 
sion to Russia, and staj-ed there till the preliminaries 
of peace between Great Britain and the United 
States were begun. 

Within two months after his return to Boston, he 
was again appointed a delegate to the Continental 
Congress. 

In those days there was no President of the United 
States. Congress was both the legislative and the 
executive. In the summer of 1784 Congress took a 
recess of several months, and, in order that the coun- 



58 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

try should not he without a government, appointed 
an executive committee of one from each State to 
continue in session and clothed with very considera- 
ble powers. Mr. Dana was selected as the one mem- 
ber of this committee from Massachusetts. 

Soon after this the jjower of the Continental Con- 
gress became very weak, while the States individually 
became more powerful. The organization of each 
State government, and the settlement of peace and 
order through the courts, seemed to be the chief 
Ijublic work for that "critical period." In 178.5 Mr. 
Dana received an appointment to the Sui^reme Bench 
of Massachusetts. He decided it was his duty to 
accept it, and so he left his seat in Congress. 

In the next two years it became apparent to the 
w^hole country that some more powerful national 
government than the loosely formed Continental 
Congress under the Articles of Confederation was 
required, and in 1787 a convention of delegates was 
established to meet in Philadelphia to frame a consti- 
tution for the United States. No more important 
public matter than this could well be conceived of, 
and the delegates to this convention were selected 
with the greatest care. Mr. Dana was appointed 
from Massachusetts, but, unfortunately, he was un- 
able to accept the appointment partly by reason of 



ORATION. 



59 



his health and partly because of pressure of his im- 
portant judicial duties. 

When the Constitution had emerged from the con- 
vention, it had to be ratified by the several States 
before it could be in force. Knowing what an almost 
priceless inheritance the Constitution has proved to 
be, it seems strange that there was strong opposition 
in those days to its adoption ; but such is the fact. 
The first great fight over its adoption arose in Massa- 
chusetts. No other considerable State would have 
adopted it, had it been rejected by Massachusetts, as 
it was in none of them more popular, and in several 
of them less so. When the Massachusetts convention 
met, a majority was opposed to the Constitution ; and 
this oiiposition was led by no less persons than John 
Hancock and Samuel Adams, who were supported by 
Gerry, who had been a delegate to the convention 
that framed it. Those in favor of the Constitution 
were led by Mr. Dana, Theophilus Parsons, who after- 
ward succeeded Mr. Dana on his resignation as Chief 
Justice of the Supreme Bench of Massachusetts, and 
Mr. Rufus King, who had been a delegate to the 
Philadelphia convention. This was the turning-point 
in the history of America. After a long struggle, in 
which Mr. Dana took a leading part and made many 
speeches, enough opponents were turned to support- 



60 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

ers; and the Constitution was ratified by a small 
majority. Afterwaixl, as you know, other States 
followed the example of Massachusetts, and so the 
United States Constitution was established, — a result, 
especially considering the closeness of the pivotal con- 
test, in no small measure due to the ability, eloquence, 
experience, and weight of j)ersonai character of Mr. 
Dana and two or three others in Massachusetts. This 
was the last of Judge Dana's political services. Three 
years afterward, in November, 1791, he was ajDpointed 
Chief Justice of Massachusetts ; and during the fifteen 
years he held that honorable post he took no active 
part in politics beyond being chosen a Presidential 
elector in 1792, 1800, and 1808. President John 
Adams in the first year of his administration found 
himself involved in great difficulties with the French 
government. It was the most important foreign 
question of that time. To settle this, he sent a 
special embassy to Paris of three envoj's; and on 
this he appointed Mr. Dana with Pinckney and John 
Marshall. It was a misfortune to the country that 
Chief Justice Dana, on account of his health, had to 
decline this appointment. Had he accepted it, he 
would have stood by Pinckney and Marshall in the 
position they took at Paris ; and our embassy would 
have presented to France and to their own country 



01 



a united front, and would have averted the embar- 
rassments caused by the failure in this resjiect on 
the part of Mr. Dana's successor. 

Such was the public career of the man for whom 
this town was named. The section of the country, 
including what is now the town of Dana, took a 
strong stand in favor of independence from Great 
Britain before the Declaration was signed at Phila- 
delphia in 1776 ; and valuable state papers, taking 
that view of the situation which, as I have just 
shown, Avas Mr. Dana's view, emanated from this 
neighborhood. This neighborhood also sent many 
soldiers to the Revolutionary War, some of whom 
very likely camped at Valley Forge, and saw and 
appreciated Mr. Dana's services in reorganizing the 
army ; and this neighborhood showed an intelligent 
interest in the affairs in which Mr. Dana was con- 
cerned in the matter of the Conciliatory Bills of Lord 
North ; the missions to France, the raising of money 
loans in Europe, the mission to Russia, and the adop- 
tion of the United States Constitution, which latter 
had occurred only thirteen years before the incor- 
jDoration of this town, and it may well be they felt 
inclined to honor the man whose career was then 
familiar to them, and who for so many years had 
been Chief Justice of the Supreme Judicial Court of 



62 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

the State. Therefore, it does not seem astonishing 
that, although the majority of the town was Demo- 
cratic by three to one at that time, and for many 
years after, and Mr. Dana was a Federalist, they 
should yet have named the town after him in 1801, 
and retained that name ever since. 

Francis Dana was not an office-seeker. The office 
in every case sought him, not he the office ; and he 
declined every position in which he felt his health 
and other duties would not enable him to fulfil the 
obligations to the satisfaction of himself and the 
benefit of his country. When in Russia he had been 
officially infoi'med that, if he would but wait a short 
time longer, he would be received in due form as 
Minister Plenipotentiary by her Imperial Majesty 
Empress Catherine ; but, feeling that he was needed 
at home, and that nothing remained in Russia but a 
formal distinction, which his successor could easily 
receive, he hurried back to attend to more important 
duties. 

He had a line sense of honor, which, in these times 
of indirect intiuenee on legislators, it may be well to 
illustrate. On the Peace Commission which I have 
mentioned, sent over by Lord North for the purpose 
of carrying out the Conciliatory Bills, was Governor 
Johnstone, who was related by marriage to Mr. Dana, 



63 



and Avliora lie had formerly met in England. This 
Governor Johnstone addressed a letter to Mr. Dana, 
with the hope of influencing him social!}' and as a 
relative to favor these measures. In order to be free 
from even the suspicion in his OAvn mind of being 
influenced by such a communication, Mr. Dana laid 
it before Congress, though the letter contained no 
such obnoxious proposals as did the letter to Mr. 
Reed, of Pennsylvania, on the same occasion. 

In these days of morbid jiryiug into the affairs of 
all our neighbors and the undue publicity given to 
the private acts of important persons, it may be well 
to tell a story of Mr. Dana at Valley Forge. He had 
come there, as I have stated, as Chairman of the 
Committee of Congress on the Army for conference 
with General Washington. One night, as Mr. Dana 
was sitting in the shadow of the veranda, "Washing- 
ton came out of the headquarters, and walked up and 
and down in deep thought. He did not observe Mr. 
Dana, who was within hearing distance, and began to 
talk aloud to himself. The desire for historical infor- 
mation or to aid him to form an opinion as a member 
of Congress might have furnished excuses for listen- 
ing; but Mr. Dana immediately came forward, and 
warned Washington that he was not alone. 

After the Revolutionary War there was a popular 



64 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

wave in favor of repudiation of debts, both private 
and public, especially when clue to foreigners or 
Tories. To those of us who remember how many 
politicians after our Civil War yielded to the clamor 
for repudiation in one fonn or another, and how few 
were not weak and vacillatiuo-, it may be well to recall 
that Mr. Dana in those old days thi-ew himself heart 
and soul in favor of honest payment, and in particu- 
lar seciu'ed by his untiring personal efforts the pay- 
ment in full of the loans to the government he had 
been instrumental in secimug ; and his descendants 
stiU have a token sent him iu recognition of his suc- 
cessful efforts in this respect. 

Now, I trust, I have shown, as I started out to do, 
that there is sometliing in Mi*. Dana's chai-acter and 
achievements, besides a slight assistance in seciu'iug 
the charter, to have caused and to justify the adop- 
tion of his name for that of this town ; that there is 
something worthy of rememln-ance, something fitting 
to follow or be an insi)U"ation to the inhabitants and 
theii" descendants after them. 

I should Kke to end my adili'ess on the hundredth 
anniversary of this tyjiical New England town by a 
few words on what has long been in my mind in 
regai'd to the towns of this Commonwealth. No- 
where else than in the old-fashioned New England 



ORATION. 65 

town do we see under modern conditions such perfect 
liberty and equality. As De Tocqueville pointed out, 
the town meetings furnish a training in self-govern- 
ment such as is to be found nowhere else in the 
world. They form a niu'sery for politicians, using 
that word in its best sense, and educate all the 
people in the principles of freedom, law, and order. 
The towns have furnished many of the celebrated 
clergymen, physicians, and lawyers, whose early train- 
ing in the town life was never lost, though their 
future careers may have brought them to the cities. 
As an offset to the city life, with its excitements and 
distractions, its feverish energy and nervous over- 
work, there is the calm satisfaction of the village life 
with its concrete attainments, with the 

"Something acconiplisheil, sometliiiig ilone, 
Has earned a night's repose." 

As on the farms is produced the foundation of the 
greater part of our wealth, so the farmers themselves 
are believed to form the backbone of our country 
politically. 

Just at present our towns are at a temporary dis- 
advantage. Many of the brightest and most active 
young men go to the cities. The competition of the 
West in many farm products has lowered what j^oliti- 
cal economists call "the margin of cultivation," so 



66 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

that many farms become unprotitable. There is a 
loss of some of the home industries caused by theu* 
concentration into the large factories. Then, too, in 
many towns we have the summer visitors. Then- 
presence is often a disturbing element. The summer 
visitor is frequently misuuderstood by the farmer, and 
the farmer not appreciated by the summer visitor. 
The summer visitor seems to be idling away his 
time when the farmer is most busy ; and some inex- 
perienced and thoughtless visitors fail to distinguish 
between the ordinary laborer and the farmer, who is 
a freeholder, of education, thrift, political sagacity, 
and descended from high-minded, well-educated, reli- 
gious ancestors, and who form no mere peasantry 
or yeomam-y. The farmer sometimes forgets that the 
summer visitor is usually a hard worker, dependent 
upon his brains, living in an age of keen competition 
and absolutely needing a sunimer's rest, whose chil- 
dren have been hard at work at school, and whose 
wife, besides the cares of housekeeping and social 
duties, has undoubtedly given much time to religious 
and philanthropic work diu'ing the autumn, winter, 
and spring, and is also in need of recreation. This 
common misunderstanding- is gTadually giving place 
to a better mutual knowledge. The summer visitor 
begins to stay longer, builds him a house, takes an 



G7 



interest in the town affairs, becomes a voter, seeks 
the acquaintance and friendship of the old families in 
the town, and brings new opportunities for the people 
of the town, contributes to the church and the town 
library. The telegi'aph, the telejihone, the daily 
paper, and the rural postal delivery are bringing the 
city and town closer together. Each as a community 
and the individuals of each are enriched and helped 
by common intercoiu'se. 

The blessings of liberty and self-government, and 
the great increase in population and prosjierity dur- 
ing the last one hundred years, have brought new 
l^roblems, which it is the duty of the next century to 
solve. Many of the evils from which we suffer are 
greatest in the great cities; but, fortunately, from 
the nature of our form of government the towns 
must take part in the remedial public opinion and 
legislation needed, and seeing that the new laws, 
when passed, are enforced. The towns cannot escape 
the responsibility if they would, and I don't believe 
they would do it if they could. I am an optimist as 
to the future of this country, but not because I be- 
lieve that good luck will carry us through, or because 
I shut my eyes to the dangers that threaten us, break- 
ing the placid surface of the current here and there 
like sunken reefs, but because I have a confidence in 



68 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

the high aims, sound sense, moral worth, justice, and 
ample activity of the American peojile, in the main 
and in the long run. The mingling of the towns 
and cities will do no good of itself unless we make 
good come out of the increased opportunities. We 
need, and I believe we shall have more than ever 
before, the sympathetic thought and the hearty 
co-oi^eration of the country people. 

We have to face the dangei's of poverty, over- 
crowding, and crime in our great cities, the horrors 
of intemperance, the increased tendency to gambling 
in high and low life, in pool-rooms and on the stock 
exchange, coiTuption in politics, the improj^er influ- 
encing of legislatures, the party " bosses," with their 
distribution of ofUces for personal ends and the 
assessments for the i:)rotection of vice, the undue use 
of money at elections, and the growing power of 
great aggressions of wealth. We have also the prob- 
lems of better methods of taxation, of improved 
public education, of more scientific charity, of the 
wiser treatment of criminals, of the public health, of 
securing a more honest and accurate count of votes, 
the protection of the secrecy of the ballot, of the 
troubles between caf)ital and labor, of the proper 
control of public franchises, and many others. To 
deal wisely with these requires the most thorough 



ORATION, 



69 



study of both human nature and of books, and new 
inventions besides. The day of crude, ill-considered 
cures is past. To understand the nature of the evils 
and their underlying causes, and to suggest the reme- 
dies, need as much thorough and intelligent discus- 
sion and unity of purpose and action as was de- 
manded in the heroic days before the Revolutionary 
War, when our Francis Dana was busying himself as 
I have desci-ibed ; and we shaU succeed now as they 
succeeded then. 

We are now, too, having the assistance of the 
women, who in their clubs are discussing svich ques- 
tions as the abolition of the party boss, by means of 
taking away his control of salaried officers, by civil 
service reform. 

To give efficient aid, the towns must not only take 
part in the discussions of these problems, but they 
must send to the legislature such leading men as 
both understand these problems and have sound 
sense and ripe judgment. 

In too many towns and cities is it customary to 
elect legislators as rewards for detail work on party 
committees, which in no wise fits them for dealing 
with the gi-eat questions of the day, or sometimes in 
exchange for large contributions from interests seek- 
ing legislative favors, distinctly unfitting them for the 



70 



DANA CENTENNIAL. 



public trust. I have known towns — but I trust no 
towns near here have ever done it — which have sent 
men to the legislature simply because they have made 
a failure of everything else in life and need the small 
salary. Legislation is a science that demands not 
only native fitness and preparation, but long experi- 
ence. Too many towns change their rein-esentatives 
every year, or, at the very most, every two years. 
Can't the towns do away with this? They must if 
they would do any real good. The problems are too 
serious, too vast to be trilled with. Why not select 
the most promising men, compel them to accej^t the 
nomination, elect them by good majorities, and, when 
they have proved themselves useful by two or three 
years' service, are getting on important committees 
and establishing reputations in the State, back them 
up and send them for decades in succession, reserv- 
ing the power to retii'e them only if they prove 
unworthy? But don't retire them as they are carv- 
ing out great policies, just to give some incompetent 
a chance to try his hand at whittling away at them. 

We know we are a big country. Our prosperity 
and importance are self-confessed ; but, for all that, 
I doubt if we have a sufficient idea of our real gi'eat- 
nese of ojiportunity for the fixture. We have only 
too much satisfaction with bigness and its imperfec- 



71 



tidns, expressed by such phrases " Well, I guess that 
will do " or " What was good enough for our fathers 
is good enough for me," as if the aspirations of oux 
honored fathers were ever satisfied with the short- 
comings about them. Nothing but the best will do, — 
not only the best things, but the best moral, social, 
intellectual ideas and institutions. 

With the co-operation of the cities and towns in 
securing the greatest freedom for the development of 
the good that is always in human natiu'e under good 
influences, and the removal of such special tempta- 
tions, degrading environment, and hampering condi- 
tions as are the results of man's contrivance, there 
seem to be no bounds to the real greatness of the 
people of this country in the future. 

May we not reverently foretell of them, somewhat 
in the words of the old prophet : From the top of 
the rocks we see them, from the hills we behold them. 
Who can count the foui'th part of them? Surely, 
there is no enchantment, neither is there any divina- 
tion against them. The Lord theii' God is with them, 
and the shout of kin<T;s is among them. 



ODE 

TO THE Town of Dana, with congratulations on her 
Centennial. 



Hats off, and all the tbroiig 

Stand ! Now, then — loud and strong — 
Three full-toned hearty, thundering Yankee cheers 

To greet our well-loved Town, 

As on she puts her crown 
The golden circle of a hundred years ! 

"Within her walls be Peace ! 

Blest with well-earned increase. 
Full be her garners with abundant store, 

The wholesome bounteous gift 

Of honorable thrift 
Be hers, and unto hers, foreyer more ! 

Strong in her Sons ! True steel 

To serve the common weal 
"With plough or sword or pen as time demand — 

To win the goodly meed 

Of manful thought and deed 
Theii's be quick wit, stout heart and steady hand ! 



73 



Fair be her Daughters ! Tlieii's 

To smile away the cares, 
To bless the heart aud hearth and home with grace ; 

Good mothers, winsome wives, 

Whose sweet unblemished lives 
Bring back the balm of Eden to our race ! 

So, in unwaning prime, 

As each new flower of time 
Is added, bright and fadeless, to her crovvn. 

Shall generations rise 

To cherish and to prize 
The ancient honor of the Mother Town. 

Feaxcis Dana. 



REMARKS 

By George W. Horr, Esq. 



When I had the honor to receive the invitation to 
attend this memorable celebration, from the com- 
mittee of arrangements, I considered it a request 
that ought and should be accepted. I thank you, 
gentlemen, from the bottom of my heart, for it. 

Your chamnan was a school-fellow of mine, in the 
old New Salem Academy on the hill, fifty-eight years 
ago. We called him then, sometimes Lafayette, and 
sometimes Nat. Our friendship commenced there, 
and pardon me, unworthy as I may have been, it 
never had a seam in it, always true as steel. God 
bless you, Nathaniel Lafayette Johnson! We are 
old now, and I am privileged to npeak of my friend. 

The good record Dana has made, in the one hun- 
dred jeavH since the town was incori^orated is a 
matter of most interesting historical truth. The 
town has jjroved true to the general principles which 
have governed the organization of the townshii^s — 
a subject which I propose to briefl^^ consider, as 
approjjriate to these exercises. 



REMARKS OF GEORGE W. HORR, ESQ. 75 

The early settlers of the Plymouth Colony dis- 
covered that the grant of eoriwrate jjowers to the 
small sei)arate settlements, and the passage of gen- 
eral laws giving them such powers and i^rivileges as 
would enable them to provide for their local needs, 
and subjecting them to the performance of such 
duties as might be required by the government of 
the whole Colony, was the Ijest and fittest way for 
the transaction of the affairs of the different locali- 
ties, and they so jn-ovided. 

This conclusion was reached, not through any reve- 
lation which perfected the system at once, but by 
degrees, through their daily and yearly experience ; 
and the system, inaugurated at Plymouth, com- 
mended itself to the Massachusetts Colony, so that 
it was adopted there at the outset. 

Considering the principles and objects of the set- 
tlers, the town system may be said to have been a 
necessity, in the existing state of things, in the early 
settlement of this part of the country. It was the 
only organization by and through which the emi- 
grants could best provide for theii- wants and have 
the full enjoyment of the liberty which they prized 
so highly, and they devised it accordingly. 

I have seen it suggested that the town organization 
had its origin in the Congregational church polity ; 



76 



DANA CENTENNIAL. 



and in fact the organization of the church, in the 
eariier settlements of the Pilgrims and Puritans, 
accompanied the organization of the town. But the 
town grew mainl}' out of the secular need : out of 
the democratic princij^le of self government, as is 
shown in the fact that change in the modes and 
forms of worship, and in different church organiza- 
tions have not affected the townships and the towns. 

The compact made on the Mayflower, which fur- 
nished the foundation of the first town organization 
at Plymouth, establishes the above facts. When they 
had combined themselves together, into a civil body 
politic, they say that it is done "to enact, constitute 
and frame such just and equal laws, ordinances, acts, 
constitutions and offices from time to time, as shall be 
thought most meet and convenient for the general 
good of the colony." 

The church polity of this people had, as a matter 
of course, a similar foundation, that of self-govern- 
ment ; but that fact did not of itself originate or give 
rise to the civil j^olity. It only accompanied it, each 
acting Avithin its own sphere. 

The settlements of New England differed from 
those of Virginia, and other Southern States, and to 
these towns, providing for local wants, and perfoi'm- 
ing local duties. New England owes much of her 



REMARKS OF GEORGE W. HORR, ESQ. 77 

wonderful prosperity ; and, although the constitutions 
and laws of the States have clianged theii- powers 
and duties somewhat, they are still most dear to the 
people. 

The early settlers wanted religious teachers and 
institutions, and, at that period, it was for the benefit 
of the civil State that the institutions of religion 
should be maintained through some organization 
having legal powei's to provide for the support of 
religious teachers. The authority of the townshijDS 
and towns to provide for the settlement of ministers 
and then- support existed for a long time. The cler- 
gyman's parish was then the town, the interests of 
town and parish were identical, and, as has been well 
said, "the parochial visits of the minister furnished 
him with sufficient muscular Christianity for all prac- 
tical purposes." 

They wanted schools and of course they needed 
schoolhouses, and for the erection of these, school- 
districts. And we find that one of the first acts of 
this young town of Dana after its incorporation was 
to raise money for schools, and the town was divided 
into five school districts. The inhabitants of the 
town with a full understanding of the local needs of 
all portions of the town, could arrange these districts, 
the people of the several districts could then deter- 



78 DA'W CENTENNIAL. 

mine the situation and the size of the house required, 
with rej^ard to their accommodation, and pecuniary 
ability ; and the tax voted by the town for the sujo- 
port of schools, being divided in an equitable man- 
ner, could then be applied to the purposes of educa- 
tion, in these districts, with the greatest possible 
efficiency. These poor little schoolhouses whether 
"red" or painted some other color, would not make 
a great show by the side of some modern structures, 
but, as a learned judge said "they did a work they 
were intended for, quite as useful, perhaps, as if the 
seats had had cushions and the desks had been of 
mahogany." 

They wanted highways, and by the energetic use 
of their powers in the town corporation, they had 
them ; and thus all the needs and necessities of these 
small communities, acting as numicipal corporations, 
Avere provided for. 

Through them, also, the inhabitants were primarily 
to enjoy such political rights as were conceded to 
them in the da^'S of the Province, and also the more 
extended and important powers which were conferred 
by the acquisition of Independence, the organization 
of the Commonwealth, and the adoption of the Con- 
stitution of the United States. 

The great French Statesman, De Tocqueville, who 



EEMAEKS OF GEOIJGE \V. HORR, ESQ. 79 

carefully studied our institutions, and so wisely inter- 
preted them, called these towns "little Democracies." 
His writings go to show that nothing could have been 
better adajjted to the execution of the tremendous 
events which occurred during the years preceding 
the Convention, in Philadelphia, in 1787, when the 
Convention which ordained the Constitution of the 
United States, assend^ling on the fourteenth day of 
May, signed the Constitution and commended it for 
ratification to the people of the United States, on the 
seventeenth of September, 1787. 

We cannot refer to these events too often. 

The first Continental Congress, in 1774 ; the sec- 
ond Continental Congress in 1775, when George 
Washington, one of its own delegates, was chosen to 
be commander-in-chief of all forces raised and to be 
raised for the struggle ; the battle of Bunker Hill ; 
July 4, 1770, adopting for the first time a name 
forever illustrious, calling themselves no longer the 
United Colonies, but the United States of America ; — 
after the Articles of Confederation had gone into 
effect in 1781 its Congress met, and a few months 
later had walked in solemn procession to one of the 
churches in Philadelphia to return thanks to God for 
the victory over Cornwallis ; — and finally, on the 
third day of September, 1783, was signed in Paris, 



80 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

by the minister of Great Britain, and in our behalf 
by John Adams, Benjamin Franklin and John Jay, a 
definite treaty of peace and independence. 

As one writer has declared : "The social privileges 
connected with the town organizations must not be 
overlooked. It made the inhabitants of the small 
tract of territory within its limits a brotherhood ; 
promoting the welfare of each other, and the whole 
community by the meeting-house, the schoolhouse, 
and the highway, and in these and other ways estab- 
lishing good order, social intercovu'se, and a kindly 
feeling." 

"The town was the efficient means which seciu'ed 
the prosperity of the household. The several fami- 
lies, farmers, mechanics, laborers and professional 
men, needed for the development of their resources, 
and the greatest enjoyment of their privileges, some- 
thing beyond even the mutual suj^port of each other 
in their various neighborhoods, and they found it in 
the town. It enlarged, while it concentrated, theii* 
sympathies, formed and moulded their ojiinions, and 
gave expansion to their united will." 

Also the military company organizations were 
mostly within the town. From these companies the 
ranks of the army have been recruited in time of 
war. The towns, in the time of the Revolution, were 



RE^IARKS OF GEORGE W. HORR, ESQ. 81 

ready and able to furnish ammunition and jirovisions. 

Permit me to repeat a few sentences of what I 
have had occasion to say in a history of this town : — 

" xUthough small in territory and population, Dana 
has never lacked in patriotism, and her sturdy sons 
have ever been ready to battle for the cause of coun- 
try and freedom. 

"A goodly number of the names of her early 
settlers appears among- the Revolutionary soldiers, 
while in the war of 1812 her men rendered valiant 
services, and when, in later times, the summons came 
for defenders of our flag and the perpetuity of the 
government and Federal Union, then trembling in 
the balance, the sons of the town were among the 
foremost to march to the rescue. 

"Few towns can show a better record. Eighty- 
eight soldiers and sailors enlisted under the various 
calls of the government, and thii-teen citizens of the 
town were em-olled in the Union army and credited 
to other places. Of the eighty-eight who were en- 
rolled and went to the front, four A\'ere killed in 
battle, and fourteen died of disease and wounds 
whUe in the service and in line of duty. 

"The citizens of Dana, brave men and patriotic, 
sympathetic women, have received most compHmen- 
tary notices from many quarters, and the good record 



82 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

of the town iu the assistance rendered for the preser- 
vation of the Union has been highly praised in official 
documents and records, State and Federal." 

I believe these town organizations, with their co- 
ordinate religions societies, of Congregational church 
polity, and free schools, laid the foundation of our 
Bepublic. 



REMARKS 

By James W. Brooks, Esq. 



Mr. PreskUnt, Ladies and Gentlemen: — You are 
all readers of your Bibles, and know that in the 
book of Genesis it is related that, while our some- 
what remote ancestor, Adam, was in a deep sleep, 
there was taken from him a rib which, it is claimed, 
became, at once, his better half and, in due time, the 
better half of all mankind. 

It would require gi-eat hardihood, even on the part 
of an old bachelor, to stand before the womanhood 
assembled here and think of questioning the claim. 
I allude to it with a far different purpose for, as I 
have heard related here to-day the history and 
achievements of your town and people and have 
contemplated the latter, greeting one another in the 
pride and pleasure of this delightful occasion, it has 
seemed to me that the old parent town of Petersham 
must have fallen into a very deep sleep when your 
forefathers, aided by one of the many eminent ances- 
tors of your distinguished orator, were allowed to 
take from her geographical body the charming rib 



84 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

she contributed to your beautiful township, and, 
when I consider that the part taken borders the 
stream and railway that turn the wheels of your 
leading industries and carry their products to your 
markets, I wonder whether, when you got our rib, 
you did not obtain — commercially speaking, at 
least, — the better half of our whole town. 

Barre, as you know, calls herself the diamond 
town of the State, because, when your forefathers 
and Judge Dana were robbing Petersham and Hard- 
wick and Greenwich, they left her angles and corners 
unimpaii'ed, and did not compel her to hold uj) her 
hands and svirrender part of her territory. 

Looking, upon the map, at the rent your great- 
grandfathers made in the Petersham diamond, I ask 
myself, as a loyal son of the old town, if I oiight not 
to appear here in the spmt of resentment and, being 
too late to reach the ears of the elders, utter some 
word of malediction upon their descendants, but, as 
I regard the athletic outlines of your orator, I am 
admonished that great discretion is to be exercised 
in engaging in personal altercation with him, and the 
admii-able use you have made of your past hundred 
years and the excellent fruit they have borne and 
the radiantly delightful spmt of harmony pervading 
your day of jubilee, in spite of its beclouded morn- 



REMARKS OF JAMES W. BROOKS, ESQ. 85 

ing, make it impossible for me to sound a discordant 
note, or do otherwise than most cordially join in your 
general cliorns of congratulation. 

Neighboring towns should not be perpetually per- 
ambulating boundaries as if they were warnings of 
"no trespassing here." Theii- metes and bounds, 
similar to those of our private deeds and convey- 
ances, simply indicate convenient and peaceful limi- 
tations in local, proprietary and political rights, duties 
and ol)ligations. In all larger aspects of public rela- 
tionship, our towns form a united sisterhood with a 
common interest, each being one of tlie fundaniental 
units of our popular government, and the prosijerity 
of each a part of the w^elfare of all. They must 
regard themselves as members one of another in all 
their local, state and national interests and relations, 
rejoicing with one another in prosperity, and sorrow- 
ing with one another in adversity. 

Instead, therefore, of resenting the secession of 
your forefathers, we of Petersham rejoice with you in 
the spirit which led them to desire and obtain an 
independent incor]>oration, in the illustrious name 
with which they christened theii- township and in 
the record which i)roves their abvmdant justification. 

The past century has recorded a greater progress 
in the material and, I believe, in political, moral and 



86 



DANA CENTENNIAL, 



religious development of the world, than has attended 
the whole j)receding- period since the death of King 
Alfred, a thousand years ago. With all the present 
interests and instrumentalities making for human 
elevation and advancement, it seems not um-eason- 
able to predict that the new century is to move on 
with yet longer and more rapid strides. 

Mr. President, you have intimated that you have 
been younger than you are to-day, but your towns- 
people evidently exj)ect to keep you young enough to 
preside over the ceremonies of 3^our next ceutenuial 
celebration. If Mr. Dana should then find it incon- 
venient to be present, you will, doubtless, invite some 
brilliant descendant of his to play the eloquent and 
graceful jjart he has played to-day. 

It is obvious, however, that my situation, what- 
ever its temperature, will be such as to compel me 
to forego the pleasure of being with you. I must, 
therefore, be content with adding to my congratula- 
tions the very cordial wish that those to assemble 
here at the end of the next one hundred years may 
have, if possible, still greater reason for rejoicing than 
have you to-day. 

I thank you for the privilege you have kindly 
accorded me, and I hope I have not sjDokeu so long 
as to persuade you that, whatever the offence of 



REMARKS OF JAMES W. BROOKS, ESQ. 87 

yoiu' ancestors against the town of Petersham, their 
descendants have been too severely punished by 
being forced to listen to what I have had to say. 



REMARKS 

By Mk. Frederick T. Comee, 



Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen: — This is a 
very imexpected cull, yet I assure you I consider it 
an honor to be permitted to participate in the com- 
memoration of the centennial anniversary of the town 
in which I was born. 

At lirst thought one hundred years seems a long 
time, but when we who have reached the half century 
period of life look back over that life we feel it has 
been of but short duration, and when we think that 
this town is only twice our age we are amazed at the 
wonderful progress that has been made since its 
incorporation. Great changes have taken place dur- 
ing the century, which in its earlier days, if considered 
at all, were looked upon as impossibilities. "With vast 
improvements in the arts and sciences, with a broader 
mind and a more liberal education, man exists to-day 
with facilities for enjoyment and improvement that 
were unknown when this town began its coi-porate 
existence. 

At that time the United States of America was 

2-OFC. 



KEMAEKS OF MR. FKEDEKICK T. COMEE. 89 

composed of sixteen states, with a total poj)ulatiou 
of about 5,300,000. These states were all situated 
east of the Mississij^pi River, the territory west of 
that point being an unexjjlored country belonging to 
other nations. Philadelphia, with a population of 
less than 70,000, was the metropolis of America. 
That city is now the third in size in the Union, and 
has a population of over 1,290,000. The city of New 
York had then reached about the same size as Phila- 
delphia. To-day that city is the largest city in the 
country, and has a population of nearly 3,500,000. 
Even near the middle of the century the city of 
Chicago, Avhich to-day is the second largest city in 
the Union, with a population of over 1,098,000, v/as 
a simple wooden village on the swamjn' shore of Lake 
Michigan. By the last census the combined popula- 
tion (Jf New York and Chicago very nearly equals the 
population of the entire United States one hundred 
years ago. At that time the streets of the large 
cities were lighted — or we might say that darkness 
in the streets Avas made visible — by a few dimly 
burning whale oil lamps, probably lighted by hand 
torches, as friction matches were then unknown. 
Watchmen went about crying the hours of the night, 
but there was no regularly organized police force 
in any city. The imi^roved farming implements of 



90 



DANA CENTENNIAL. 



to-day, the modern loom, traveling crane, steam 
drill, steam jiump, steam shovel, sewing machine, 
and many other inventions which have revolutionized 
labor and added so much to the comfort, convenience, 
and jileasure of life, Avere not known. Medicine and 
surgery had made but little progress. The old prac- 
titioner had practically three principal remedies, — 
bleeding, calomel and laudanum, — and amputation 
was the limit of surgery, the patient, securely bound 
or held by strong men to prevent his moving, being- 
conscious through the operation. 

In very many other channels great improvements 
have been made, but those that appeal to me most 
strongly as being of especial benefit to the great 
mass of our peoj^le are the present facilities for 
transportation and the transmission of thought. 
Travel by land was formerly hy the jn-imitiAe stage 
coach or upon horse back, and by sea in clumsy 
wooden sailing vessels. These have now given jilace 
to the luxurious parlor and sleeping cars and the 
magnificent steel steamship, well named " the ocean 
greyhound." 

A journey from Boston to Ncav York one hundred 
years ago required three days; to-day the distance 
can be covered in four hours. From New York 
across the Atlantic was a journey of from three 



REMARKS OF MR. FREDERICK T. COMEE. 91 

weeks to thi-ee months ; it can now be made in five 
days and a few hours, and I read in a daily paper 
yesterday that a company was in process of forma- 
tion whose ships were expected to make the passage 
in four and a half days. A hundred years ago an 
answer to an important communication from New 
York to London might be received in from six weeks 
to six months, the time depending upon the condi- 
tions of the wind and Aveather. To-day a message 
can be sent from New York to London and the 
answer received in seven minutes, and one can stand 
in this town and cai'ry on a conversation with a per- 
son a thousand miles distant. A hundred years ago 
newspapers were exceedingly rare. They were all 
j)rinted on the old "Hand Press;" an expert jn-ess- 
man might possibly make seventy or eighty impres- 
sions per hour. With the paper printed vipon both 
sides the limit would be forty papers per hour. To- 
day a machine is built that receives large rolls of 
paper, prints, cuts, pastes, folds and counts 9G,()00 
papers per hour. One hundred years ago masses 
lived and died knowing little or nothing about what 
was being done about them. To-day the news of 
the world is daily scattered broadcast over the land. 
Now what do all these signify ? Do they say to us 
that invention and science have reached the limit of 



92 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

improvement ? Quite the reverse. I regard the won- 
derful achievements of the past century as the prom- 
ise of a more giorious and briUiant future, and beheve 
the knowledge and opjiortunities of to-day will lead to 
still further and more imijortant discoveries than are 
now dreamed of, and possibly those who assemble to 
celebrate the second centennial of this town may 
regard the conditions of this day somewhat as we 
look uj^on the conditions that existed a century ago. 

Ladies and Gentlemen, I thank you for your atten- 
tion. 



PiE:\LARKS 

By Rev. Haklan Page. 



The towu of Hardwick extends her wa,i'mest con- 
gratulatious to Daua on this hei" festal day. This 
is the da}' that rightfully belongs to the sons and 
daughters of Dana, and considering that I must not 
occupy much of your time. 

No^v, friends, we stand here with one hundred 
years finished. We yie^v the past with pride. We 
ought to ; but we cannot fully appreciate it unless 
we look with hope and courage towards the future. 

It is a goodly sight to behold so many sons and 
daughters of Dana here to-day. Someone has said, 
" Show me a man who has no love of place, and you 
have shown me whose heart has no tap root." And 
the spot where the heart of the real man beats deep- 
est and truest is the place of his birth. There lived 
his mother, there were his first youthful ambitions. 
Our thought has lieen directed to-day to the great 
and distinguished men of this town, and very properly 
so. But as I glance up and down these seats which 
are before me, l^eholdiug your faces, and knowing 



94 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

the intellectual power and character and true heart 
that reside in this peojile — I include you all, and 
make bold to say the future of the town of Dana 
rests with you, with what you each shall do in these 
homes and in your life from day to day. As Winthrop 
once said, " I shall call that my country where I may 
most glorify God." Shall not each one here make 
his own, with some slight changes to fit the present 
occasion — these lines so familiar to us all? 

"Breathes there a man with soul so dead, 
Who never to himself has said 
This is mv own, my native town." 



REMARKS 

By Hon. George K. Tufts. 



Mr. President (Did Ladies and Gentlemeyi : — It 
gives lue pleasure to bring the congratulations of 
the sister town of New Braintree to you on the 
occasion of the observance of your one hundredth 
birthday. We have just celebrated ours and for 
many reasons I had hoped your celebration could 
have antedated ours that we might have gotten 
some points from you as to its proper observance, 
for arrangements for an event like this, which occurs 
but once in many generations, cannot profit from the 
experience of the past. 

You have met here to-day for the renewal of old 
associations, to strengthen the ties that bind you to 
the ancient hearthstone, to gain a better knowledge 
of your heritage, at once a source of gratitude for 
the past, and of inspiration for the future. 

I want to bear my tribute of acknowledgment and 
thanks to your historian for the patience, the indus- 
try, and the devotion he has shown in the prepara- 
tion and presentation of that admirable paper he 



96 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

gave us tliis morning'. But few, if any, realize the 
vast amount of lal)or involved in such an undertak- 
ing. I have no doul^t he has consumed many times 
the midnight oil, deciphering, perhaps not without 
the aid of the microscope, the handwriting that has 
been almost obliterated by age, in order to obtain 
the information needed to form some chain of events 
or establish some important point. And it has been 
with him primarily and wholly a labor of love, an 
offering upon the altar of patriotism and affection for 
the time of his childhood and later years. If this 
anniversary had resiilted in nothing else than in the 
preparation and presentation of this historical paper 
it would have ami)ly repaid all the money and labor 
and anxiety expended upon it. 

I want to say a word about the value of these olcT 
records from which he has gathered this information. 
I do not believe the public generally have a trvie con- 
ception of the value of their local annals. These old 
records, with leaves often mice-bitten, stained and 
musty, sometimes almost obliterated by age and then 
again written with a clear hand and with ink that put 
to shame the modern article now prescribed by the 
Commonwealth, contain all that for many generations 
went to make up the life of your town, civilly, politi- 
cally, financially, educationally, religiously, and to 



REMARKS OF HON. GEORGE K. TUFTS. 97 

some cleo-ree sociaUy. Tliev are the records not of 
the nation, nor of the state, nor of the country, nor 
of the to\vn of Harchyick or Barre, hut of the to\vn 
of Dana, and, therefore, pecuharly 3'our o^yn. They 
are the records of the hyes of the men and ^yomen 
^yho cleared the lands you no^y occupy, builded and 
beautified theu- homes, reared their families, founded 
and put a lasting impress upon your institutions and 
by courage, self-denial and a loyal adherence to theii- 
sense of duty, stern and exacting though it might be, 
combined to make yours a rej)resentatiye Ne^y Eng- 
land to^yu. They ought to be printed in clear type 
and used as a text book in your iniblic schools, along- 
side the histories of the state and nation, and be 
familiar to eyery boy and girl of the coming genera- 
tion. 

In conclusion I wish to exj^ress my ^ippreciation of 
the admii-able sketch, dra^yn by the orator of the day, 
of the traits that should characterize the la\y-makers 
of this i^eople. They would make an ideal common- 
wealth. 



ADDEESS 

By Rev. T. C. Martin. 



Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen : — As I listened 
to the admii'able historical paper by Mr. Johnson and 
the masterly oration by Mr. Dana, I have been im- 
l^ressed by three things. First, I noticed the fathers, 
one hundred years ago, desii'ed a neAv township 
because it was too far for them to go to meeting 
at either Greenwich, Petersham or Barre. They 
must have a town of their own in order that they 
might have a meeting-house near by. Religion, 
then, was one of the first and great moving causes 
for the incorporation of the town of Dana. The 
people wanted to go to church. Now, as a distin- 
guished orator once said of Massachusetts, " The past 
is secure." So we point with pride to the fathers of 
Dana. They were religious. The past is secure. A 
very vital question suggests itself : Ai'e we, the chil- 
dren's children, desirous of church privileges? One 
of the speakers to-day told us of the wonderful inven- 
tions of the nineteenth centiuy. Have our people 
found some easy way of getting to church or getting 



ADDRESS BY REV. T. C. MARTIN, 99 

ou without the church? We have rejuvenated the 
church building- standing j'onder. It is conveniently 
located. Now, as I said, the vital question to-day is, 
do the people want to go to church? The fathers 
did. All honor to them. 

The second point I noticed was, that the fathers 
wanted a new town that they might have their own 
and near-by schools for theii- children. Education, 
therefoi'e, was one of the moving causes for the incor- 
poration of Dana. As it was too far to go to chiu-eh 
from this centre to either Petersham, BaiTe or Green- 
wich, so it was too far for the children to go to school. 
The fathers valued education. Si^eaking in the very 
shadow of your schoolhouse, I need not exhort you 
along this line. Beginning with an apj^ropriation of 
$175 for schools, Dana has looked well to her educa- 
tional interests. The example of a Dana mother toil- 
ing early and late to send her children away to secure 
a higher education has been a constant inspiration to 
me and others. You need no word from me. But 
palsied be the arm or the vote that would in any way 
by jn'ivate or sectarian school undermine the founda- 
tion of our grand American public school system. 
The fathers planted it in their povert}-. Let us pre- 
serve it. . 

The thii'd item I noticed was the character of the 



100 DANA CENTENNIAL. 

man after whom the town was named. In A'ain have 
your historian and others searched to find any special 
interest which Honorable Francis Dana took in the 
incorporation of the town. He did nothing sjiecially 
for its incori^oration. The movers for a charter 
wanted a name. The name of "Washington was taken 
for the capital of the country. But there was a name 
of sterlino- integrity, sound judgment, honored on 
two continents, a man who admired Washington and 
served his country at very, very critical points in her 
history. This man's name the charter members of 
our town took because of his manhood, his char- 
acter — for no one deed of his, but for all his deeds. 
I come from a town named after an illustrious soldier. 
Francis Dana was more than a soldier. He was a 
statesman, the flower and fruit of those early days of 
religious and educational struggle. 

I begin to see now what I had noticed in Worces- 
ter, in Boston, and wherever I meet Dana people, 
what I may call the Dana spiiit. In England there 
is what they call the "non-couformiat conscience." 
At Yale there is the "Yale Sjiirit." I have noticed 
a Dana Spirit, so to speak — a love for this little 
town that has surprised me. I now see on what it 
has fed, how it has sprung up and grown. Religion, 
education, character, these are the three roots that 



ADDRESS BY REV. T. C. MARTIN. 101 

have nourished it. I am prouder of her than ever. 
May these ever characterize her as they siu-ely were 
the characteristics of her early founders. 

I looked in vain in your art collection yonder for a 
picture or a painting of Francis Dana. I want to see 
how he looked. I have a clear mental picture of him 
from what I have heard of him to-day. Until I see 
his picture I shall continue to think of him as a sec- 
ond Washington, for it seems to me, that in the work 
he did at St. Petersham, St. James' Court, at Phila- 
delphia, and at Washington, he must have stood very 
near, if not second to, the "Father of his Country." 



EEMARKS 

By Charles R. Johnson, Esq. 



Mr. Chairman and Ladies and Gentlemen : — I 
thank you for your kindly gi-eeting. My office as 
a member of the executive committee has thus far 
been to act rather than to speak, and I had not 
expected to be called ujjon at this time. I am glad, 
however, to have this oi^portunity to say to you all 
collectively, as I have j^reviously said to so many 
individually, that I am most happy to be here, to 
shake the hands of friends and schoolmates of long 
ago, and to view again scenes familiar to my early 
youth. 

There is no spot about this Common but has a deep 
interest for me. In yonder building I first went to 
school. In the church across the way I earliest 
attended public worship. The cemetery near by is 
the last earthly resting place of generations of my 
ancestors. Recollections like these must come to 
many of you, as to me, on taking a look backward. 
We must all realize that time is fleeting, and that 
there are large gaps in the cii'cle of our acquaint- 



REMARKS OF CHARLES R. JOHNSON, ESQ. 103 

cances — gaps constantly made wider by the sickle of 
the grim reaper. Thinking thus, we can but value 
highly occasions like these when old friends and 
schoolmates can come together, if but for a brief 
season, and in fancy bask again in the sunshine of 
youth. 

I trust that before these exercises close an effort 
will be made, in some organized way, to bring about 
another and similar gathering in the near future. If 
that is done, and we shall by that means succeed in 
establishing here the institution of an "old home 
week," and so iJeriietuating a continuance of these 
annual festivals, the most beneficent result of this 
celebration will have been accomjjlished. 



Letters of regret were received from Hem-y Hale 
and J. Warren Hale of Philadelphia, Pa., and Dr. C. 
Thayer of Clifton Springs Sanatorium, New York, 
also Mrs. Urzulah Towne of Boston. 



